MAJOR SHIFTS in the control of local authorities in Kerry are likely following last week’s elections, with talks being finalised yesterday between Fine Gael and Labour for the control of Kerry County Council.
A Labour-Fine Gael alliance is also set to hold sway on Tralee Town Council, breaking the traditional Labour-Fianna Fáil alliance. Labour and Independents are also likely to take over Killarney Town Council from Fianna Fáil for the next five years. The shift in power in Kerry, due to extra Fine Gael and Labour seats and losses by Fianna Fáil, will see Fianna Fáil and its allies miss out on lucrative jobs on committees and conferences which they have held for decades.
The Independent Healy-Rae brothers, Danny and Michael, poll-toppers who have traditionally supported Fianna Fáil, will also be out in the cold as far as key jobs are concerned.
Michael Healy-Rae has twice been mayor of the county, under an agreement with Fianna Fáil, and he has been on important committees such as the regional health forum. Sinn Féin will also miss out on committee positions in special policy areas.
Fianna Fáil, which was supported by Sinn Féin in the last council, has lost seats in four out of the five Kerry wards, while Fine Gael has returned with three extra seats and Labour with one extra.
Fine Gael’s Bobby O’Connell, likely to be the county’s first Fine Gael chairman in almost 40 years, said it was good to see change. He said it will have been 42 years – or the election of 1967 – since Fine Gael last took control of Kerry County Council.
Labour will hold the mayorship for two years, and Fine Gael for three.
In Killarney – which has an all-male council for the first time in 10 years – the South Kerry Independent Alliance poll-topper Michael Gleeson is set to become mayor.
In Tralee, the traditional Fianna Fáil-Labour pact looks set to end in favour of a Fine Gael-Labour pact, and it is speculated that Arthur J Spring, who topped the poll, will take over the chair or at least the vice-chair at some point.
Mr Spring, a nephew of former Labour leader Dick Spring, is also poised for the vice-chair of Kerry County Council. He topped the poll in both the Tralee urban and Tralee rural areas. This was his first time to run for election.