Counting gets underway for Dublin councils at Local Elections 2024

Fine Gael have secured 25.1% of first preference votes across the country. They are followed closely by Fiann Fail on 23.9%. There has been a big surge for Independents who have secured 17.3% of first preferences.

Sinn Fein are next on 12.8% followed by the Greens on 8%. Voter turnout was just under 60% across the country.

Here’s how tallies are looking in Howth Malahide

The count for South East Inner LEA has started.

Counters in Mayo have been warned to be careful as a mouse may have got into a ballet box there. Meanwhile a number of rings have been returned to people after they fell into ballot boxes in Wexford and Wicklow.

At the last General Election, Sinn Fein were criticised for not running enough candidates on the back of a surge in support for the party. But this time it’s looking like they may have fielded too many candidates with the vote being split in a number of LEAs and further prefernces unlikely to transfer to running mates.

These are just tallies so far with the counting set to begin later this afternoon and transfers will play a big part in who secures seats.

Early indications are that transfers are going to be very unpredictable with preferences a little all over the place by the looks of things and often not going along party lines. It’s going to make for a very interesting day!

Sinn Fein’s Daithi Doolan performing well in boxes opened in Ballyfermot where he is a councillor. Eleswhere, Brid Smith of PBP-Solidarity, Niall Boylan of Independent Ireland and Sinn Féin’s Lynn Boylan doing well in Kimmage/Rathmines.

In Clontarf, Labour’s Aodhan O Riordain and Fianna Fáil’s Barry Andrews are performing strongly.

Initial tallies are showing the Green Party and Fine Gael are polling well while Sinn Fein are doing poorly in the Dublin-Rathdown part of the LEA. But as with all of these tallies, it’s still very early days and there are a lot of boxes still to be opened.