Waterford constituency profile: Fine Gael will be gunning to retake a seat here

Outgoing TDs: Mary Butler (FF), David Cullinane (SF), Marc Ó Cathasaigh (GP), Matt Shanahan (Ind)

Who are the candidates running in Waterford?

Mary Butler (FF)
Ronan Cleary (AON)
Frank Conway (IND)
David Cullinane (SF)
John Cummins (FG)
Patrick Curtin (PBPS)
Aaron Joyce (IND)
Killian Mangan (IND)
Conor D McGuinness (SF)
Marc Ó Cathasaigh (GP)
Mark O’Neill (IND)
Sadhbh O’Neill (LAB)
Mary Roche (SD)
Matt Shanahan (IND)
John D Walsh (IP)
Source Waterford returning officer

Fine Gael will be gunning to retake a seat in the constituency where a Deasy was a representative from 1977 to 2020, and off the back of local elections where it claimed the most seats of any party. It looks likely to do so through John Cummins.

Sinn Féin has a chance of a second seat here that would have been nailed on a year ago. The constituency is home to one of its highest vote-getters in Cullinane, and it has a good geographic split along east/west lines, with Conor McGuinness having almost a clear run at west Waterford votes. Sinn Féin bucked the national trend in the local elections here, polling at 21 per cent – 10 points higher than its national figure.

But McGuinness will have to find transfers from somewhere, even if he gets a good first-preference vote. Butler should improve on Fianna Fáil’s middling performance in the locals, where it polled below the national figure, and if she does, she will likely be safe.

The massive Cullinane surplus that elected Marc Ó Cathasaigh won’t be repeated. The Green is as strong a candidate in a non-Dublin constituency as the party has, but this is just one of several factors working against him, alongside the party’s lower polling.

Watch the centre-left transfers as those candidates are eliminated, as the beneficiary there will most likely be ensconced in the third seat – and at the moment, it looks like a dogfight between Sinn Féin’s McGuinness and Independent Matt Shanahan for the last seat, with Shanahan positioned to shade it.

Left unchanged by the constituency review, Waterford is a traditional mix of rural areas and big towns, with around half the vote coming from Waterford city. The big local issue is no longer the second cath lab for Waterford hospital, replaced by the campaign for a runway extension at Waterford Airport. Mary Butler will not have thanked party colleague James Lawless for his recent “pig in a poke” contribution on this topic.