POLITICAL PARTY allegiance is a more important factor than neighbourliness in elections, it was argued in court yesterday. The case involves a challenge to last year’s town council election in Boyle, Co Roscommon.
Willie Tiernan, a former Labour councillor, is seeking to have the outcome of the June 2009 poll declared void and a fresh election held, on the basis that 18 people voted in the Boyle urban area who were not entitled to.
That figure was increased from 17 yesterday following legal submissions.
During the second day of the hearing at Boyle Circuit Court, Judge Michael White heard that a crucial aspect of the case was how Fianna Fáil candidate Doreen Caldbeck’s votes would have transferred had she been eliminated instead of Mr Tiernan.
Ms Caldbeck, a Fianna Fáil candidate, was just one vote ahead of Mr Tiernan on the sixth count when he was eliminated.
Prof Richard Sinnott from the school of politics and international relations at UCD, told the court that he had obtained preliminary figures from the Department of the Environment outlining the proportion of transfers which went to Fianna Fáil and to Labour following the elimination of Fianna Fáil candidates during town council elections nationwide in 2009.
The analysis showed that where both parties still had candidates in the race available to take transfers, Fianna Fáil got 45.5 per cent and Labour 9 per cent.
The court also heard that while there had been evidence of a decline in the level of Fianna Fáil transfers remaining within the party in recent years, this had reversed at the last general election, when 67 per cent of Fianna Fáil transfers stayed with the party, up from 59 per cent in 2002.
Prof Sinnott agreed with Richard Humphreys SC, for Mr Tiernan, that the 18-vote irregularity was the equivalent of from 540 to 700 votes in a five-seater Dáil constituency, which would be viewed as a “quite sensational” error.
He said it was “a nice illustration” of the gravity of the problem. Pressed further, Prof Sinnott said it was “not impossible” that the outcome of an election could be affected by such an error.
Dr Michael O’Kelly, a statistician who did his PhD on voting patterns in Irish elections, told the court that he did not believe that 18 votes could have closed the gap for Mr Tiernan.
He pointed out that the transfer from Mr Tiernan to Ms Caldbeck in the seventh count was low at just three out of 87, which was “a little surprising” given that they were near neighbours.
Dr O’Kelly said that while locality was a factor in these things, it was not as significant as party loyalty.
“Political allegiance tops neighbourliness in your experience as a statistician?” asked Judge White.
Dr O’Kelly said it did. He said distance was a factor and in his research, he had found that 100 yards in a city was equivalent to a mile in the country.
The hearing was adjourned to Longford Circuit Court on June 30th.