Lynn Ruane re-elected to Seanad on eighth count

All three University of Dublin Seanad seats have now been filled

Lynn Ruane has been re-elected a University of Dublin Senator on the eighth count, filling the third and final constituency seat.

Ruane received a total of 4,072 votes out of a total valid poll of 15,041, Provost Patrick Prendergast, the returning officer, announced. 

The count, which has now concluded, took place in the Dargan Theatre in the Trinity Business School. 

All three University of Dublin Seanad seats have now been filled by the incumbents. David Norris was re-elected  on the fourth count, while Ivana Bacik was elected on the sixth count. 

Hugo MacNeill, the retired rugby player and former director of Goldman Sachs, came in fourth place with 2,961 votes. In fifth was Tom Clonan, a retired Irish army captain, lecturer and security analyst, with 1,172 votes. He was eliminated on the seventh count and his votes were redistributed. 

The other five candidates – Joseph O’Gorman, Abbas Ali O’Shea, Derek Byrne, Keith Scanlon and William Priestly – were all eliminated and their votes redistributed on earlier counts. Byrne and Ali O’Shea were eliminated first, followed by O’Gorman, then Scanlon and finally Priestley. 

Norris was first elected to the Seanad in 1987 and will now serve his ninth term in the Seanad. Bacik, a Reid Professor of Criminal Law in Trinity’s Law School, was first elected in 2007. Lynn Ruane was elected to the Seanad in 2016 while serving as Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) president.

All six university Seanad seats have now been filled. Incumbent senators Rónán Mullen, Michael McDowell and Alice Mary Higgins were re-elected to the Seanad for the National University of Ireland (NUI) constituency. 

Aisling Grace

Aisling Grace was the Editor-in-Chief of the 66th Volume of Trinity News. She was also formerly Online Editor and Deputy News Editor.