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TAOISEACH ENDA KENNY has kept his seat in Mayo, topping the poll in the first count.
The Fine Gael leader was speaking to reporters in the Castlebar count centre as the result was announced. He was reacting to the so-far disastrous result for Fine Gael candidates across the country, telling our reporter Orla Ryan that he felt,
“Disappointed. And sorrow for many of those people. Democracy is always exciting but it is merciless when it kicks in. That said, at the same time, we’ve had substantial results in a number of constituencies.”
He added:
It more or less puts Fine Gael back to where we were in 2007.
Kenny took 13,318 first preferences to exceed a quota of 12,730 in the Mayo constituency. His running mate Michael Ring is so far coming second with 11,275. Fianna Fáil’s Dara Calleary and Lisa Chambers are in third and fourth place respectively with 9,402 and 8,231. The third FG candidate in the constituency, Michelle Mulherin, is running at 7,841, in fifth place.
Speaking to RTÉ, he said that he planned to stay on as leader of Fine Gael and that he had a duty as the current “head of government” and as “leader of a major bloc in the Oireachtas” in the forthcoming 32nd Dáil to focus on putting a government together.
He conceded that his “preference of a Fine Gael and Labour (government) could not now be returned”. He would not be pressed on the possibility of a FG-FF coalition, insisting that he would have to “look at all the counts, all the results” before knowing how to proceed.
Kenny admitted:
The option of a majority government is gone. The option of a Fine Gael-Labour government is gone. I need to know the final resulst before I decide what the best thing is to do.
TheJournal Politics / TwitterEnda Kenny wants to wait until all votes are in to see what Fine Gael's options are #mayo #ge16 pic.twitter.com/2URBmHsClR
— TheJournal Politics (@TJ_Politics) February 27, 2016
Enda Kenny has now won all 13 Dáil elections since the by-election of 1975, when he took over after the death of his father Henry. He entered the Dáil at the age of 24, and has now spent almost 41 years as a TD in Mayo. He will be the most electorally successful and longest-serving member of the next Dáil.
Meanwhile, his Tánaiste, Labour’s Joan Burton, had to fight for her seat in Dublin West. She managed to take the fourth seat in the fifth count. Health Minister Leo Varadkar (FG) took the first seat, followed by Ruth Coppinger of AAA/PBP and Jack Chambers of FF.
TheJournal.ie’s Orla Ryan heard Kenny say that voters who had been “ashamed” to vote for Fianna Fáil in 2011 came out yesterday:
TheJournal Politics / TwitterEnda Kenny: People who were "ashamed" to vote for Fianna Fáil in 2011 came out to vote again yesterday #mayo #GE16 pic.twitter.com/CdFAwHtYsu
— TheJournal Politics (@TJ_Politics) February 27, 2016
- with reporting from Orla Ryan in Castlebar
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An electric fence to stop swimmers going in would probably be more effective!
Doubt it, humans are pretty dumb
Unprecedented for sharks to attack you in their home!! Their bloody home. Sharks never attack anything dry. Remember that.
Increased shark attacks are a good indicator of over-fishing. This is a band-aid solution to a much bigger problem that is being ignored.
Feed the sharks. Let them know it’s Christmas time.
Dame sharks looking for meal how dare they!
Rule should be simple, enter the water and you make yourself shark bate end of, no one else’s fault when you lose your limbs
What’s a Dame shark? One that’s received an order of the British Empire?
Aren’t selfie-sticks even more dangerous?
Australia (or anyone else) has no right to “get tough with sharks”. FFS. The oceans are their element – they can exist nowhere else. They are an essential part of the chain of life and they’re being slaughtered in their millions because of a stupid film, and Chinese superstition. Swim in a bleedin’ pool if you’re too warm, Ozzies, or take to the sea when there are no sharks present. Also, cut down on the over fishing – everything in the ocean is hungrier than ever because we are sweeping it of all food sources..
Has anyone even considered sending some Marines in to infiltrate and bite the sharks?
Funny, reading this you’d think its a mass shark feeding frenzy out there. But I was down at bondi beach yesterday and as usual there were about 100 surfers in the water. They don’t seem too bothered. Wouldn’t get me in there though, fook that. Maybe I need to stay off the journal for a while..
Sharks are massive, unpredictable and have big teeth. All makes for good news. Hundreds of thousands of Australians enjoy the water every week without being attacked. Things that people fear and things that are likely to kill them are very different things.
Turning the sea into a zoo they are.
Erm. . The sharks are doing the same thing they’ve been doing for around 450 MILLION YEARS.. they’ve been on the planet longer than humans and survived 5 mass extinctions, yet now in 2015 they’re suddenly the bad guys becsuse idiots can’t leave them to their natural habitat.
The chances of having an encounter with a shark are slim to none. You enter the water at your own risk.
Forgive me for going off topic, but wow, what a picture. Great snap. That seal must have more lives than a cat.
Get out of the water!!
Poor Jaws gets a bad rep..It’s not the worst of the bunch. http://m.thenewdaily.com.au/news/2015/06/26/deadliest-australian-animals/
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