At last, the General Election campaign is officially underway.
The question that was preoccupying politicos for months has been straight-forward enough: November or February.
In recent weeks it has been apparent, at least, that it would be in 2024. Now we have our date. The country goes to the polls on Friday, November 29. Counting will begin the following day and will continue into Sunday and Monday, at the very least.
The new Dail will meet for the first time a week or ten days before Christmas but it’s likely to be the New Year before we have a new Government.
Just over a month ago, the new Laois three-seater constituency would have been deemed one of the most predictable in the country. On the only previous occasion that Laois was a constituency in its own right without Offaly – back in 2016 – there were just six candidates, it took only three counts and it was all wrapped up by tea time on Saturday evening.
Now things aren’t as straight forward, even if there are probably three strong favourites to take the three seats, at this juncture, three weeks out from election day.
Brian Stanley’s explosive resignation from Sinn Fein after over 40 years of service to the party – and the subsequent bitter fallout – has meant that it has scarcely been out of the national news cycle for the past month.
Now the question is if Stanley is vulnerable or not?
In 2020, in the then Laois-Offaly constituency, he got over 16,500 first preferences and had a quota and a half. At one stage there was a suggestion that he could possibly challenge to bring a second Sinn Fein candidate to the Dail with him in this election.
Now he’s an Independent Republican, going up against Sinn Fein and Sinn Fein are going up against him. It has been a venomous fallout.
How much of the previous vote was a Brian Stanley vote? How much of it was Sinn Fein? How will it all break down now? How much will it actually be split?
Of those 16,654 votes in 2020, the guts of 6,000 of them were in Offaly. But Portarlington, Ballybrittas and Killenard are back in Laois now having voted in Kildare South four years ago.
There has been a solid Local Election vote in that area for Aidan Mullins – once of Sinn Fein but now an Independent also – that are up for grabs now.
Do they stick with Sinn Fein and their new candidate Maria McCormack? Do they go with Stanley? Do they go to Portarlington-based Independent Elaine Mullally, who was the first name in the hat and has hit the ground running with a vibrant campaign?
Given the saga that he’s been through, it’s understandable that Stanley is discussed as the target. But how bullet proof are the other big hitters, Fianna Fáil’s Sean Fleming and Fine Gael’s new standard bearer Willie Aird?
The quota will be in or around 9,000, 25% of the vote. If Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil fall well short of that and neither of them have a big surplus, how transfer friendly will they be from the other candidates, whose votes are likely to stick together?
How much will Austin Stack’s arrival impact on Sean Fleming? Will it take or will it add? A strong showing from Stack and he’s in pole position to be the heir apparent to Fleming’s seat when that time comes.
Fine Gael lost the seat before in Laois, though doing so again when there’s a supposed lift under Simon Harris would be a huge setback. Willie Aird has a massive record in his own right and now aims to tap into Charlie Flanagan’s old support as well. It’s a huge base to work from but it’s no guarantee either.
Of the new candidates challenging to break through, Independent Aisling Moran has the highest profile currently. She’s the only one that has contested elections before, twice being elected in the Graiguecullen-Portarlington Municipal District, first for Fine Gael, and most recently as an Independent. Her late father John got 4,306 first preferences in 2011 for Fine Gael as Charlie Flanagan’s running mate. If Aisling gets close to that, she could be in the running.
Geographically she’s in a corner of the county, on the Kildare border and not far from Carlow. But she has enlisted the support of fellow councillors Tommy Mulligan from Portlaoise, Ben Brennan from Crettyard and James Kelly from Mountrath, all big vote getters in their own area.
Heavily invested in her campaign and actively involved on the ground, how much of their own local vote can they now get out for Moran?
If a strong newcomer is to emerge, they probably need to be north of 4,500 after the first count and have the right person ahead of them in catching distance.
Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael votes will largely stick together; likewise the non-Government candidates should all transfer to each other.
With still almost three weeks to go to polling day there’s plenty of time for new issues to emerge that will shape this election.
Laois had been deemed sleepily predictable up to now. That doesn’t seem to be the case any more.
The political scene in the county has had the eyes of the nation on it over the past month. A hard-fought campaign and a gripping count would round it off nicely.
SEE ALSO – Check out all our 2024 General Election coverage here
