CONSTITUENCY PROFILE:IN A hotly contested three-seater the key question seems to be, who will win the last seat?
No candidate likes to be told they’re a winner. However, according to the polls, indications are that Labour will keep the seat held by Tommy Broughan, spokesman on transport until he failed to follow his party line of opposition to the stag hunting ban.
Terence Flanagan, the only Fine Gael candidate, is also expected to retain the seat he won in 2007 when he narrowly defeated sitting Fianna Fáil TD Martin Brady.
At issue is the Fianna Fáil seat being vacated after 34 years by veteran political survivor and Dublin North East grandee Michael Woods; it’s all change on the party ticket. The veterans are gone, replaced by Averil Power (32), the only female and youngest declared candidate.
She is a former president of Trinity College students’ union and is policy adviser to Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport Mary Hanafin, appointed when she held the education portfolio.
Power was a local election candidate last year and got a profile boost with her appointment on Monday to the Fianna Fáil front bench as spokeswoman on political reform.
The Fianna Fáil vote has collapsed from the almost 40 per cent high of 2007, but the Bayside-based candidate is expected to give a good account of herself in this election. The constituency takes in Darndale, Raheny, Coolock, Portmarnock, Howth, Sutton and Baldoyle.
Portmarnock and Balgriffin were moved into the constituency in the last boundary change and this will help the Fianna Fáil candidate who has a base here and stood for the party in the area last year.
Her vote will be affected by former Fianna Fáil, now Independent candidate, Jimmy Guerin who is running in the same Howth, Sutton, Baldoyle area.
The Green Party’s David Healy will also be chasing this vote.
Labour wants to win two seats and has the same two candidates, Broughan and Seán Kenny, victors of the 1992 Spring tide, when it was a four-seater. The two are competitive rivals, and Raheny-based Kenny won some 4,350 votes in the local election when the quota was about 1,800.
Part of Edenmore, in the south end of the constituency is being transferred to Dublin North Central.
This was a loss to another serious contender, Larry O’Toole, a councillor since 1999. He loses some of his Edenmore base which has gone to Dublin North Central and has little prospect in the newly added areas of Baldoyle and Portmarnock. But he has a strong personal vote and, at nearly 13.5 per cent the last time, he was almost 5 per cent above the party’s national ratings. If he does the same again, he could be a winner.
Brian Greene, a United Left Alliance candidate, polled a respectable 1,032 votes in Fingal in the local elections and adds to that crowded left field.
Candidates need to be heading for 23 per cent to 25 per cent to be a true contender. Labour is polling about 30 per cent but, as one number cruncher points out, Fianna Fáil had nearly 40 per cent in 2007 when not considered “toxic” and still could not win two seats.
Labour, polling at 30 per cent, or a quota and a half, is unlikely to do it either unless the party candidate stays ahead of O’Toole at each count. It could be a mountain that’s just too high to climb.
There is a Fianna Fáil vote there, but at about 16 per cent it is also unlikely to take Power across the line.
DUBLIN NORTH EAST: 3 SEATS
OUTGOING TDS: Tommy Broughan (Lab); Terence Flanagan (FG); Michael Woods (FF).
DECLARED CANDIDATES: Tommy Broughan (Lab), Seán Kenny (Lab); Terence Flanagan (FG); Averil
Power (FF); Larry O'Toole (SF); David Healy (Green); Brian Greene (ULA); Jimmy Guerin (Ind).
LOCAL ISSUES:It is all about the economy – unemployment and job security are big issues with
concerns about companies under pressure. A major drop in incomes
in January wage packets is raising questions about whether this is
the last of the cuts or if there will be more. The mortgage burden on
young home owners is an issue in areas such as Clongriffin/Balgriffin, where a massive housing project was developed and only a fraction of the
houses and apartments have been occupied. Questions are being asked about the EU-IMF deal and bondholders and what each party's policy is.
VERDICT: FG 1; LAB 1; SF 1
