Mayo TD expresses disappointment at Sinn Féin performance
Mayo TD Rose Conway Walsh struck a sanguine tone at Sinn Féin’s result at the count centre today.
A poor performance from her party nationally and in Mayo forecasts the party may only add one new councillor to the chamber, depending on John Sheahan’s race in Swinford, but that is far from guaranteed.
However, Deputy Conway Walsh remarked that it would be a “100% increase in councillors in Mayo for the party.”
Rosaleen Dixon Lally was expected to poll well in Belmullet but looks to have failed in her bid to unseat incumbent Erris-based councillors Gerry Coyle and Sean Carey of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, respectively.
Sinn Féin’s two constituency offices are both in north Mayo, one in Belmullet and the other in Ballina.
Deputy Walsh-Conway made no qualms in expressing her desire to get help in establishing party infrastructure in the county to build upon her strong 2020 general election campaign.
"I want to congratulate our candidates who ran here in the county. They put in phenomenal work. I know what it’s like to not be elected.
"I got 952 votes in 2007 and failed to get over the line then. But it was everyone’s first time running in any election, and the only two who ran before, Gerry Murray and John Sheahan who ran in the Ballina area in 2014, it’s no surprise these are the two who look likeliest to win a seat for Sinn Féin in Mayo."
Rose Conway Walsh received over 3,000 of first preference votes in Castlebar in 2020, but that vote failed to land with local election candidates Donna Hyland and Maura O’Sullivan.
Instead, a wave of votes went towards independents in Castlebar.
When asked if these were her votes from 2020 going to candidates running on an anti-immigration platform, Deputy Walsh replied: “I hope they’re not our votes.”
Conway-Walsh added: "We’ll have to try and win votes back, it’s as simple as that," and declared any conversation around general election strategy with an additional candidate joining her on the ticket was “too soon.”