A FINE Gael TD has confirmed he is not standing in the next general election, bringing the number of sitting TDs not contesting the next election to 13.
Galway East TD Ulick Burke (67) said yesterday he would not run again, just days after his constituency and party colleagues Paul Connaughton (66) Seymour Crawford (66) also announced they were quitting politics.
Fine Gael holds two of four seats in Galway East, with Mr Burke reclaiming in 2007 the seat he lost five years before.
Mr Burke said he believed the elderly and parents of children with special needs had been “let down”, and he felt somewhat “disillusioned”.
The former teacher was first elected to the Dáil in 1987. He was also a member of the Seanad from 1981 to 1982, as a taoiseach’s nominee, from 1983 to 1987 and from 2002 to 2007.
Mr Connaughton is retiring after almost 40 years in politics. The farmer and former Galway county councillor was first elected to the Dáil in 1981. He held a junior ministry in the Department of Agriculture from 1982 to 1987, and various front bench opposition posts.
It is expected that his son, Paul Connaughton jnr, will compete for the nomination in Galway East, following his father’s retirement.
Former Progressive Democrat leader and now Independent Senator Ciarán Cannon is one of the candidates expected to run in the election, along with several other councillors.
Mr Connaughton said it was time for younger people to be given an opportunity, and noted that politics had “changed dramatically” in the past four decades.
The political landscape in Galway West is also expected to change, with Labour Party president and sitting TD Michael D Higgins opting to run for the presidency, if nominated. Labour city councillor Derek Nolan has been selected to run for the party in his place.
Galway West Fianna Fáil TD and former minister Frank Fahey has also said he believes his seat is a “goner” – a prediction he has also made in previous elections.
“I have no illusions that I will lose my seat,”Mr Fahey told the Galway Advertiser this week, and he forecast that his party would hold on to only one of its seats in the five-seater constituency – that held by his colleague and Minister for Social Protection Éamon Ó Cuív.