LE19 – Close call in final four seats for Rathfarnham-Templeogue area
By Hayden Moore
THERE was a dogfight for the final four seats in Rathfarnham-Templeogue as Fianna Fáil Cllr Paul Foley lost his seat by a margin of just 44 votes, while his party-mate Yvonne Collins got in just ahead of him.
Major delays over the course of the weekend led to Rathfarnham-Templeogue being the last ward to finalise its seven seats, with crew in Citywest already having much of the counting centre disassembled when the ward finally got across the line well after 10pm Sunday night.
Cllr Pamela Kearns (Labour) with Cllr Mick Duff and former councillor Breeda Bonner
It went down to the wire with it ultimately coming down to the process of elimination as five candidates awaited the ninth count to see who would fill the remaining four seats based on the re-distribution of Labour’s Paddy Cosgrave’s votes.
Fine Gael’s Mary Seery-Kearney and David McManus and Social Democrat’s Carly Bailey all had their names called out before Yvonne Collins, Paul Foley’s Fianna Fáil party-mate, got into the seventh seat.
Collins squeezed past Foley by a margin of just 44 votes, picking up 221 votes on the final count.
Paul Foley had seemed a shoe-in to retain his seat when the first count for the ward was announced and it placed him fourth on first preference votes, just over 800 away from the quota of 2543.
Also on that first count, in what was a shock across the weekend for the entire country as the Green Party made a resurgence, William Priestly was elected on first preference votes alone.
Re-elected Ronan McMahon (Ind) with his son Niall
First-time candidate, Priestley, eclipsed the quota by more than 300 votes and became the first to take a seat in the new Rathfarnham-Templeogue ward – and was quickly followed by Independent Ronan McMahon and Labour’s Pamela Kearns retaining their seats.
With a whopping 49.2 percent turnout in that area, it was among the highest in South Dublin County Council.
Candidates elected
Rathfarnham Templeogue (7 seats)
1st William Priestley (GP)
4th Ronan McMahon (Ind)
7th Pamela Kearns (Lab)
9th Mary Seery Kearney (FG)
9th Carley Bailey (SD)
9th David McManus (FG)
9th Yvonne Collins (FF)
