Labour election bloodbath predicted
Bookies are predicting a nightmare local election for the Labour Party in Galway City – and Fianna Fáil to gain three seats.
Odds offered by bookmaker John Mulholland suggest that Labour will lose three seats on the City Council – despite the number of councillors rising from 15 to 18 following the recent reform of local government.
The former city mayor believes the make-up of the new Council will be: six Fianna Fáil, five Independents, four Fine Gael, two Labour and one Sinn Féin.
In the City Central ward, Mayor Padraig Conneely (FG) and Billy Cameron (Lab) are described as “home and hosed” at a price of 1/66, with Ollie Crowe right behind on 1/40.
In City East Terry O’Flaherty (Ind) is predicted to be poll-topper at 1/50, followed by Declan McDonnell (Ind) on 1/33.
In the City West Ward, Mulholland predicts Catherine Connolly (Ind) will be the poll-topper, followed by Donal Lyons (Ind) at 1/99.
“The safest seats in the city appear to be Catherine Connolly and Donal Lyons in the West, Terry O’Flaherty and Declan McDonnell in the East and Padraig Conneely, Billy Cameron and Ollie Crowe look home and hosed already in the City Central ward, which has shot up from four seats to six in this election,” Mr Mulholland said.
In City East, Labour’s Tom Costello is retiring, while Nuala Nolan is given an outside chance (7/2) of hanging onto the seat into which she was co-opted, while in Central, Colette Connolly is predicted to lose out (11/10), with new candidate John McDonagh (5/2) also failing to make it.
For more on this story, see the Galway City Tribune.