Despite big constituency changes elsewhere, it remains a four-seater with just smaller boundary switches.
Current TDs (four seats)
Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Sinn Féin), Bríd Smith (Solidarity People Before Profit), Patrick Costello (Green Party), Joan Collins (Independent)
Who could make gains?
Last time Ó Snodaigh, a TD here since 2002, got almost 40pc of the vote for Sinn Féin with two quotas, a wasted haul since he had no running mate. This time he will be joined by Councillor Máire Devine, a former senator, who also stood in 2016. But real hopes of a second seat here have been blunted by a drop in the party’s support nationally.
Smith (SPBP) is retiring having served two terms since 2016 and her place on the party ticket goes to Councillor Hazel De Nortúin. This change may ease a little pressure on Costello (GP) and Joan Collins (Ind), but both were elected on the last count in 2020 and will still have a battle to hold their seats with fierce competition among left-leaning candidates.
Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, Labour and the Social Democrats all have some hopes of winning here. Fianna Fáil are running Senator Catherine Ardagh, daughter of late local TD, Seán Ardagh, and she had a strong vote here in both 2016 and 2020.
Fine Gael are fielding Senator Mary Seery Kearney, a barrister and former councillor. Both coalition parties will put in a big effort to regain a foothold in a constituency they were long represented in down the years.
Any boundary changes that could be crucial?
Nothing major. Part of the Kimmage electoral division – previously in Dublin Bay South and with a population of 3,738 – has been moved to Dublin South Central. Some of this constituency’s electoral divisions in the west will move to Dublin South West and Dublin Mid West.
Councillor Darragh Moriarty (Labour), Councillor Jen Cummins (Social Democrats) and Aisling Considine (Aontú) are also standing. This was previously a good base for Labour in better times for that party.
The performance of right-leaning candidates, Councillor Philip Sutcliffe (Independent Ireland), Rebecca Hendrick (Independent Ireland), and Barry Ward (Irish Freedom Party) will be watched with great interest. They can be expected to focus on housing and migration.
On the Ballot
Jina Ahearne is from a group of right-leaning parties which includes her own group, the Irish People. She says she is standing for election to champion “an Ireland that is gaelic and free”. Ms Ahearne pledged to campaign on housing and migration and has identified with a number of campaigns including preservation of the 1916 Rebellion sites at Moore Street in Dublin.
Ms Ardagh has been a senator since 2016 and stood twice for the Dáil here getting a strong vote each time but falling short of a seat. A qualified solicitor, she is well known in the area. She is the daughter of the deceased local TD, Seán Ardagh, who served here from 1997 until 2011.
A Right to Change candidate, Ms Collins is a former post office official, first elected in 2011 for People Before Profit and which she left in 2013, remaining Independent, and later founding her own party. She has won three elections. A long-time left-wing political activist and trade unionist, joining many campaigns including opposition to bin and water charges.
Aisling Considine is a primary school teacher and union activist elected to Dublin City Council last June. She is a fluent Irish speaker and language enthusiast. She won a council seat but failed in a bid to win a European Parliament seat. She says she will campaign for better policing and improvements in housing for the area.
Mr Costello was a social worker first elected to Dublin City Council in the 2014 “green wave”, winning again in the 2019 local election. First elected to the Dáil in 2020, he has at times been a party dissident in government. Husband of Hazel Chu, a former Dublin Lord Mayor, standing for the Greens in Dublin Bay South.
Cllr Cummins has lived in the Liberties for the past 20 years and both her parents also come from the south inner-city locality. A member of Dublin City Council she cites promoting education in the area as a major priority. She is a former youth worker and is now coordinator of the Ballymun Anseo school completion programme working with DEIS schools.
Ms De Nortúin takes the party nomination of outgoing TD, Bríd Smith, who is standing down after eight years. Cllr De Nortúin says she was motivated to enter politics in an effort to promote the Gaelscoil movement in the area and has a long association with left-wing politics. From Cherry Orchard she argues that disadvantaged areas are too often ignored.
Máire Devine is a trained psychiatric nurse and former union activist who served in the Seanad from 2016 until 2020, and previously stood here in the 2016 Dáil election. In that contest she got almost 3,500 first preferences but was eliminated after the fifth count. This time she is part of a risky three-candidate strategy to seek a second seat.
originally from Cork, Mr Doolan is a long-time veteran of many election campaigns and has been a Dublin City Council member since 2004. He is a member of the James Connolly Cumann in Ballyfermot, Dublin. Mr Doolan was first elected to Dublin City Council in 2004 and represents the Ballyfermot-Drimnagh area. Based in Ballyfermot he is a veteran of many political campaigns.
Rebecca Hendrick describes herself as a community activist and volunteer who returned to college as a mature student making her passionate about education. She argues that the area has a great deal of deprivation which impacts upon people’s physical and mental health and limits their life’s chances.
Mr Moriarty was first coopted to Dublin city council to replace Senator Rebecca Moynihan in 2020 after she went to the Seanad. Re-elected in 2020 he now leads his party’s council group. His family ran a shop near the Coombe Hospital, where he grew up and he now lives in Inchicore.
Richard Murray says he is a long-time campaigner on causes as diverse as opposition to water charges to improved housing access and battling against homelessness. He insists that he has always been an independent, avoiding political parties and he is not trying to bandwagon on current popularity of independents.
Mr Ó Snodaigh is a former teacher and official with Bord na Gaeilge, first elected here in May 2002 after earlier unsuccessfully standing elsewhere in Dublin. Initially one of just five Sinn Féin TDs, he is a long-time influential party figure as the organisation has grown, and he was outgoing chair of the Oireachtas Gaeilge committee.
Mary Seery Kearney is a barrister, senator, and former Dublin South county councillor, who was also previously chief executive of Dublin YMCA. Ms Seery Kearney has also worked as a parliamentary adviser to Fine Gael TDs and worked on the Constitutional Convention, which sat from 2012 until 2014, to consider updates to the 1937 Irish Constitution.
Philip Sutcliffe is a former national boxing champion who twice represented Ireland at the Olympic Games in 1980 and 1984. Elected a councillor for Drimnagh last June and has made strong statements about crime and the management of immigration. He is a former Irish soldier and now a respected boxing coach.
Barry Ward is a native of Crumlin where he now lives and was a youth leader in Bru Crumlin. A former lorry driver, he set up his own business but says he had to close it during Covid because of restrictions. He is pledging to fight for small business rights and improved housing access for Irish people while opposing vulture funds.
Dolores Webster came to prominence for campaigning against Covid vaccinations in 2021. She is standing on a platform spanning a wide range of community and family issues.
