MulhollandÕs statistic slashes odds on FG getting second Galway West seat

Date Published: {J}

Fine Gael’s John Mulholland has been a long time connected with politics in Galway, both as boy and man. A former Mayor of Galway, he lost his seat on Galway City Council at the Local Elections in June 2009, but he is still one of the ‘elder statesman’ in Fine Gael ranks in Galway West.

So, when Mulholland talks, people still tend to sit-up and listen.

As a man running a major business as a bookie (The Better Bettor), he is one accustomed to working out the odds, and shouting them. So, when he came up with a suggestion that FG might be closer than I have suggested to that second seat in Galway West that Enda Kenny is demanding, I said I had better go off and do like any good punter – check the form.

I ran into Mulholland a week ago at ‘a bit of a do’ and (surprisingly!) we got talking about politics. As a matter of fact there was a scattering from Fine Gael (TDs Padraic McCormack, Ulick Burke and Paul Connaughton, Senator Fidelma Healy-Eames), and TD Noel Grealish and Councillor Terry O’Flaherty  (Independent – former PDs). All  ended up talking politics of various  sorts.

Mulholland was the one who set a number of us thinking when he took me to task on that second FG seat issue.

All along I have been suggesting that FG have a well-nigh impossible task on their hands in trying to win a second Dáil seat in five-seater Galway West, where Fianna Fáil have two (Minister Éamon Ó Cuív and Frank Fahey), Fine Gael 1 (McCormack), Labour 1 (Michael D Higgins), and Independents 1 (Grealish).

My argument has been that with just 20% of the first preferences at the last General Election in 2007, and with such a competitive constituency – compared to some others in the west which are a straight fight between FF and FG – the Fine Gael task could prove beyond them, despite their best efforts.

Their ticket has not been worked out yet and is likely to come from McCormack, Healy-Eames, Cllr Brian Walsh, Cllr Padraig Conneely, Cllr Hildegarde Naughton, Cllr Sean Kyne, Councillor Eileen Mannion, and JJ Lee, a candidate in the 2009 Local Elections.

The basis of my argument was that Fine Gael got only 20% of the first preferences in Galway West in the 2007 General Election – a growth of just 3% from the 2002 Election. My opinion was that, with a hugely competitive constituency in which the competition involves Fianna Fáil, Labour, and a strong Independent (former PD Grealish), Fine Gael would be put to the pin of their collars to try to achieve the vote growth of close on ten per cent needed to put them in the running for a second seat.

In a five-seater, a quota comes out at just over 16%. Now, to win two seats Fine Gael might not require two full quotas, as many seats are filled without reaching the quota . . . they would, however, need a minimum figure in the high-twenties and a hell of a vote management strategy to be the hunt for a second seat.

But then along comes Mulholland at that ‘bit of a do’ and produces a challenge to my dismissal of the FG dream … he pointed out that, at the Local Elections in June 2009, Fine Gael got 27% of the first preferences in the electoral areas in the county which are part of Galway West.

Not being a man to bandy figures with a bookie, I headed off into the files to check just what the situation was, and whether FG might be more ‘in the running’ than I considered.

Not surprisingly, Mulholland turned out to be correct. I had checked first with McCormack as to whether the figures could be extracted – he confirmed that if the Local Election returns for the Galway City Wards (Electoral Areas) were extracted and put together with the returns from Connemara and Oranmore areas, then they covered the entire area of Galway West.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.