Revealed: Women dominate Newport LEA which becomes the first area to fill seats

Female candidates were the dominant force in the Newport LEA with three of the four seats being taken by the fairer sex, with John Carroll filling the fourth seat on Sunday afternoon.

In doing so, Newport LEA has become the first electoral area to fill its seats after a prolonged but inevitable wait for the sitting Fianna Fail Councillor John Carroll to take the final seat in the third count.

Fiona Bonfield, Pamela Quirke O’Meara, and Phyll Bugler will make up three-quarters of the electorate in the Nenagh Municipal District and Tipperary County Council in the next five years, in what is an unusual occurrence at any level of politics.

Though he did not reach the quota of 1,623, there were not enough surplus votes to help either of the other two candidates surpass his votes, and with that, Carroll was elected; Gavin Ryan and Eddie O’Gorman lost out under a lack of possible distributions.

In doing so, Carroll put the remaining candidates out of their purgatory with David Ahern eliminated after the second count.

Labour candidate Fiona Bonfield was the runaway candidate in the first tallies on Saturday and she led from the front to her election at the first count, registering a big total of 2,346 votes.

There were two other candidates over the line in the first count along with Bonfield on Saturday night, with a surprise performance from newcomer from Team Lowry, Pamela Quirke O’Meara who is second highest in terms of votes, hitting 1,665 votes. 

Sitting Fine Gael Councillor Phyll Bugler retained her seat, also in the first count, just shy of Quirke O’Meara with 1,636 votes to her name, and that meant that there would have to be an overnight wait for John Carroll to confirm the fourth and final seat.

Despite not getting in on the second count, it was a case of being patient for the Kilcolman-based Councillor who won back his seat just after noon on Sunday which confirmed the Newport LEA as the first Tipperary electorate to wrap up in the Count Centre in the Presentation Secondary School in Thurles.