World of Politics with Harry McGee

Back in 2002, the Progressive Democrats came up with a strategy to succeed Bobby Molloy. Instead of running one candidate, the party opted for running three.

There were two city councillors, Donal Lyons and Declan McDonnell, and a member of Galway County Council, Noel Grealish.

Molloy had been a huge vote-getter. He was first elected to the Dáil in 1965, finishing third in the constituency. Ever after he topped the poll, often by a significant margin. This continued after he left Fianna Fáil to become a founding member of the PDs in 1986. He topped the poll in 1987 and continued to do so until 1992 when Michael D Higgins was top of the pecking order on the back of the so-called Spring Tide (Labour won 33 seats in that election).

You can see the rationale the PDs had in running three in 2002. All of them were relatively well known in their areas but would have not had a huge profile outside their own neighbourhoods. A councillor from the western suburbs of the city. A councillor from the eastern suburbs. And then somebody from a rural area. Combine them together and they would be close to a quota.

Grealish finished with 5.5 per cent of the vote after the first count, or 2,735 votes. It was less than a third of the quota.

The rule of thumb for Galway West is that a candidate needed north of 10 per cent to guarantee election in Galway West and often 12, or 13, per cent.

Grealish, in the heel of the hunt, took the last of the five seats. At the time people said it was a master strategy by the PDs. However, Grealish only picked up a total of less than 1,500 from his two running mates. It was not a very efficient transfer, with him getting about 50 percent of the available votes from his colleagues. He was still at only about half a quota? What elected him in the end was transfers from others, plus the surplus of Michael D Higgins.

There are things about Galway West that are easy to predict and things about the constituency that are not. When Molloy was in his pomp, you could always chalk him down for a seat, no matter what. The same went when Éamon Ó Cúiv was there.

Pictured: The ‘chosen one’? Gráinne Seoige, on a campaign walkabout in An Spidéal at the weekend with party leader Micheál Martin.