“Bellweather” constituency, when it comes to elections, refers to the notion of a single part of the country where the result might predict the outcome of the national battle more than any other. If such a title exists in Irish elections, then Kildare North might have a good claim to it.
The constituency has a bit of everything: It has grown substantially in population in recent years, having been affected both by trans-national migration and the more mundane movement of people from Dublin to the commuter belt. Yet it also retains a rural character, being home to some of the best farmland in the country. It is an industrial heartland, home to Intel and other enormous employers. It suffers particularly badly from infrastructure bottlenecks around schools. It has a third level student population in Maynooth, and contains thousands of people who deal with long daily commutes. If the constituency could be summed up in a vignette, then it would be my own experience of getting stuck behind a farmer’s slurry tank while driving on a bad road to visit my friend who had just swapped life in Dublin for a new-four-bedroom house in a town called Prosperous.
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