The first candidates have been elected to Seanad Éireann, the upper house of the Oireachtas, as the counting process for the five vocational panels is continuing at Leinster House.
Independents Michael McDowell, Ronán Mullen and Alice Mary Higgins have all been re-elected to the Seanad on the National University of Ireland (NUI) panel. Meanwhile, incumbent senator Lynn Ruane, Tom Clonan, and Aubrey McCarthy look likely to take the three seats on the Trinity panel.
However, a “simple” recount will take place for the final seat on the Trinity Seanad panel after 31 votes separated Green Party councillor Hazel Chu and entrepreneur Aubrey McCarthy, who looks set to take the final seat.
Those elected to university panels only make up ten per cent of the 60 seats in the upper house of the Oireachtas, the primary function of which is to debate legislation. Unlike local and Dáil elections, the pool of voters is much smaller. Eleven senators are nominated by the Taoiseach, with the remaining majority set to be filled on vocational panels.
How do vocational panels work?
Voting has now commenced to determine who will take the 43 seats to be filled across five panels. Each of the five panels corresponds to a grouping of “interests and services” of which candidates are required to have “knowledge and practical experience.”
These panels are administrative (seven seats), agricultural (11 seats), cultural and educational (five seats), industrial and commercial (nine seats) and labour (eleven seats).
Technically, there are no political parties within the Seanad, as each person is said to be there independently; however, Senators do divide into groups when it comes to voting on government business.
Candidates for panels are selected by nominating organisations or by members of the incoming Dáil or outgoing Seanad. The deadline for nominations to the Seanad Vocational panels closed on the 17th January.
The 43 Senators across the vocational panels are elected by members of the Dáil, councillors and outgoing senators.
TDs as well as councillors and outgoing senators are eligible to vote for nominees to the industrial panels, accounting for about 1,200 voters. Many among the 141 nominees are outgoing senators, and amongst candidates are a significant number of former TDs and candidates who were not successful in November’s General Election.
The nominations are made by Oireachtas members as well as by members of the Register of Nominating Bodies from trade unions and non-governmental organisations to diverse groups. Votes are multiplied by one thousand because the pool of voters is so small, and so that the vote can be divided into a clear fraction. For instance, Sinn Fein’s Pauline Tully topped the Cultural and Educational panel. She received 189,000 votes on the first count – meaning she received a total of 189 votes (16.5 per cent) of the total electoral vote of 1,172.
On the Cultural and Education panel, Cathal Byrne, Shane Curley, Seán Kyne, and Joe Conway have also been elected.
On this panel, outgoing senator Lorraine Clifford-Lee of Fianna Fáil, has lost out on a seat. Clifford-Lee, who was nominated by the Taoiseach to become a Senator in June 2020, having previously been selected from the 2016 to 2020 Cultural and Educational Panel, was excluded following a recount this morning. Ms Clifford-Lee lost her Seanad seat by 0.676 of a vote.
The former Senator came in a fraction of a vote behind Waterford independent councillor, Joe Conway, while former Sinn Féin Cavan-Monaghan TD Pauline Tully topped the poll.
Voting continues today, with voting now underway for the Agricultural panel.
Voting for a remainder of panels will continue this weekend, with live coverage via Oireachtas News.