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THE PERFORMANCE OF the Social Democrats in the general election was one of the major successes of the campaign, with the party jumping to six TDs.
Formed in 2015 with three TDs, the party fell short of expectations in the 2016 election and failed to get any additional candidates elected.
There was a further blow to the party in September 2016, when co-leader Stephen Donnelly announced that he would be leaving the party, reducing representation in the Dáil to only Catherine Murphy and Róisín Shortall.
Now, things seem to be changing.
In Donnelly’s own constituency of Wicklow, the Social Democrats candidate Jennifer Whitmore was elected above Donnelly (now with Fianna Fáil), winning more than 2,000 votes than her old party colleague.
For the first time, the party can reasonably argue it’s an all-Ireland political force, winning seats as far as Cork and posting solid results in constituencies such as Meath West.
Dermot Looney, the party’s Director of Elections, said that the fact it was a snap election did prove “difficult”.
“For some candidates and teams, that made things pretty hard,” he said.
Ahead of the election, the party certainly faced issues. There were no signs of an upcoming electoral breakthrough in the by-elections in November, while in Dublin Fingal and Dun Laoghaire, two well-known local candidates announced that they wouldn’t be contesting the election.
There were staffing issues too, with two vacancies – the head of policy and the head of communications – both left unfilled by the time Taoiseach Leo Varadkar announced that an election would take place on 8 February.
With seven staff prepared to run a national campaign, the omens weren’t particularly good.
Facing up to a short campaign, the party had a relatively simple strategy.
“We were very aware of not running paper candidates. Everyone we ran was a legitimate person involved in their community,” Looney said.
Unlike the similarly sized Green Party, which runs candidates in every constituency regardless of the chances of winning, the Social Democrats landed on a more strategic approach.
“We would be right in targeting seats where we felt the party could grow,” Looney says, referencing the Green Party’s near wipeout in 2011 when it ran 43 candidates but only received 1.85% of the vote.
It’s a strategy that appears to have paid dividends. Jumping from two TDs to six, the party consciously ran candidates who already had a profile locally.
Some were well known. Apart from Whitmore in Wicklow, who topped the poll in Greystones in the May local elections, Dublin Central candidate and high-profile councillor Gary Gannon had been tipped to take a seat after narrowly losing out to Maureen O’Sullivan in 2016.
But there were new faces too in which the party had invested high hopes. Holly Cairns in Cork South-West, despite only being elected to the local council in May 2019, had been tipped as a possible contender to take a seat – and rewarded those expectations by becoming the only female TD in Cork.
Looney describes the candidates as “rooted” in their constituencies and credits the repeal campaign for offering some of the party’s new faces a way into politics.
“Almost all of our candidates were involved in the repeal campaign,” Looney said.
When it comes to candidates, “ideally the party would have run a few more,” he adds.
Still, it wasn’t all success. In Galway West, Niall Ó Tuathail – one of the party’s hopes – failed to win a seat.
Some suggested that Ó Tuathail’s failure was partly down to his decision not to contest the local council elections in May.
“We’re not disappointed at all with Galway West,” Looney said.
“At the end of the day, Niall didn’t want to run in the locals,” he adds. “His heart wasn’t in it.”
In that constituency, the party puts the blame on the Sinn Féin surge that attracted a younger cohort of voters who on another day might have voted Social Democrat.
Regardless of a few disappointments, the party is certainly pleased with last week’s result.
It’s now level on seats with its left-of-centre rival – and much more established party – Labour and has a higher proportion of female TDs than any other party.
Now, as the big parties struggle to form a government, the party wants to be ready for whatever the future brings.
Looney is clear: “We will need to prepare in the coming weeks for another election.”
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I really hope they charge them, it’s the right road to take and might make other parents think twice about buying a gun for a 15 year old on black Friday!?! What a pair of human meat sacks…. They need to answer to the poor parents of the kids he killed. What a warped country.
@Dawn Harvey: they have been charged. It’s why they are in court.
@transik: a few teens hanging around on a street corner is the exact same as multiple school shootings every year alright.
The comments section for this article is open but the one below it about Prince Andrew is closed??
Are they not just as responsible as the leader who instigated the Capitol building riots? Leading to murdr
@Dean: “Are they not just as responsible as the leader who instigated the Capitol building riots? Leading to murdr”
Who was murdered at the Capitol riot?
@Dean: what murder?
If you start charging people over the actions of their children, where do you stop. And where’s the line. I just don’t see this case sticking at all. The fact they’re having a break in the case has all the signalling that this case won’t stand up. And I think that’s the right decision. Sure you can charge someone with not safety storing a weapon but this leap to murder is far too remote. This case is a knee jerk reaction by local authorities towards a grieving community.
@RogersRabbit: the father bought a gun for his 15-year old and knew about his intention to carry out a school massacre. That’s at least manslaughter, if not enticing to murder.
@RogersRabbit: the school asked the parents to remove the child from school and to bring him to a counsellor because of his concerning behaviour. They refused and left the child in school, without any support. They have at the very least neglected their own child big way, that’s criminally punishable
@RogersRabbit: michigan is one of the only, if not the only state in the USA that doesn’t require that a gun be stored under lock and key by law. However it is illegal for someone under the age of 18 to possess a handgun there and they bought it for him for his 16th birthday. Furthermore the mother told the kid not to get caught in future when the school reported that he was caught looking at amunition on his phone. I agree that it’s going to be tough to get the manslaughter charges to stick though. Which is a pity because his parents come across as s c u m. Hopefully they’ll get some sort of federal conviction so they are never able to own guns again.
@Sebastian Manka: that hasn’t been established. The father buying a gun and the parents being told teachers were concerned about him once or twice are two independent things.
@Daniela Monza: since when is not bringing your child to a counsellor criminally punishable. There’s a big diff between being a bad parent and one that should be in prison.
@RogersRabbit: they failed to secure their weapon as the law requires resulting in the commission of a crime. We don’t need further gun laws; we need the existing laws enforced.
Because he is 15 and the crimes he’s alleged to have committed are so serious. And at 15 he’s old enough to know what he did was wrong. Also the age at with serious crimes are been committed is dropping, and consideration is taken into account if this person poses a serious threat or is likely to reoffend.
Could someone explain why/how he is being tried as an adult please?
@Waylanderj: it is a legal option subject to a legal challenge pending his mental health evaluation. Setting an arbitrary age is not a standard across the US. Do you think a standard period is superior to an individual maturity assessment? His trial should he plead not guilty, will be informative.
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