AT THE COUNT:Fine Gaelers stay cool in victory but roof is raised when one Gerry Adams arrives at the RDS, writes KATHY SHERIDAN
FINE GAELERS don’t lose ugly. They don’t win ugly either, which partly explains the subdued atmosphere shrouding the vast RDS count hall on Saturday.
When declared elected, the routine for Fine Gaelers is to smile a tad more broadly, allow themselves to be bounced awkwardly once or twice, then leave quietly with their nice families. At least Susan Bruton – Richard’s cheerful spouse, surrounded by their four children, Neil, John, Lucy and Natalie – was happily drawing up plans. “I have a big list of ‘you owe me’ – shopping trips, holidays, a missed Valentine’s . . .”
She wasn’t entirely serious but, hey, miracles happen. Lucinda Creighton’s preternaturally confident young running mate, Eoghan Murphy – who, God help him, was being likened to “a young JFK” by one entranced constituent – hardly changed expression when declared. Hot news for the crazed followers who christened him “Councillor Yummy”: he doesn’t have a girlfriend.
Meanwhile, Paschal Donohoe was swinging his two small children, insisting, “I am HUGELY excited”. More accurately, he was hugely shocked. “I can’t believe this is happening. I remember standing here only a couple of years ago and thinking ‘how do you get elected?’ I was locked in by the strength of the Fianna Fáil and the Tony Gregory machines. There seemed no way through it.”
Just then, came the breathless news that lads from the Drumcondra Mafia were way down at the Dublin Central tables giving evils to Mary Fitzpatrick’s gang. By the time we reached the scene, she was eating pizza and calmly swapping her elegant cream and brown heels for ungainly but huggably furry flat boots.
Nearby, Bertie's old diggers, Dublin Central director of elections, Paddy Reilly aka Paddy 'the Plasterer', Chris Wall and Bertie's longtime companion, Anna Bogle, were peering at ballot papers. (Bertie, according to the Daily Mail, was pitching up at Croke Park for a Dublin match.
So how were campaign, um, relations between Bertie’s lads and Mary’s? “There were NO relations,” spat a Mary supporter. At precisely 11.14pm, the Ahern era passed into history with Cyprian Brady’s unceremonious elimination. No one noticed – apart from one beaming Fitzpatrick supporter: “We should put up a plaque. Here lies the Ahern machine, 1977-2011”.
Later, as Fitzpatrick’s hopes lay in tatters again, Bertie’s old pals lingered. “They’ve achieved what they came for, to keep Mary out,” said the same supporter bitterly.
The Haughey era also ended (maybe) on Saturday, in an exit dignified by the behaviour of Seán and his family. His grandfather, Seán Lemass, would have urged them to regroup and show no emotion, he said; his father would have told them to “fight, fight and fight again”.
“It’s a strange place to be,” said his sister Eimear Mulhern. “It’s very sad for Fianna Fáil and sad for my mother. I’m glad my father’s not here. But it’s time for them all to get a life and start again.”
Pat Carey took his leave in equally gracious fashion, wishing his successors well. A supporter ground his teeth: “You know, we got an e-mail last week with a pdf about how to use Facebook. What does that tell you?” he asked incredulously.
Later, John Gormley too exited the political stage, with his wife, Penny, and party stalwart Eamon Ryan at his side. No, he had no regrets, he said, repeatedly.
“We’re not going away,” Ryan assured a well-wisher outside, as Gormley wearily asked his troops about meeting later for dinner. Inside, Patricia McKenna tried valiantly not to say “I told you so”, before saying it anyway. Significantly, she still uses “we” when talking about the party. She also didn’t rule out a coup.
The contrast between that and the scene over at Dublin South Central was sharp. There the truth was dawning on Joan Collins of the United Left Alliance, that she was in. “It’s like a dream. I’m very proud and overwhelmed,” she said softly, watched proudly by her elegant mother Tess, and dozens of supporters.
The woman who famously confronted Bertie Ahern outside the Dáil, agreed that it certainly gave her campaign momentum (as indeed he implied in his ill-advised response that day).
Anyway, whatever the dress code in her new workplace, her nose stud (and multiple ear piercings) will not be moved: “That stud has been there for 25 to 30 years.’’
Suddenly from outside, came a roar. A mass of feverish supporters flocked round the door, whistling, roaring, chanting “Ger-ree, Ger-ree.” Mr Adams was here, triggering a frantic unfurling of Irish Tricolours.
“Oh look – there must be an Irish person here,” observed an onlooker acidly. The triumphalism absent for much of the long day has finally landed. “Ger-ree TD , Ger-ree TD.” Dessie Ellis was glowing beside him. “This year 22 years ago, Dessie was extradited by a Fianna Fáil government,” said a woman in the crowd, “and it’s a Fianna Fáil seat that he’s taken”.
Joan Collins’s own triumphal entry with Joe Higgins had been delayed by the Shinners, but her welcome was equally delirious. ULA supporters rocked the house with a mighty chant: “The workers/United/Will never be defeated”.
Labour failed to look cowed. Ruairí Quinn had topped the poll after all. Róisín Shortall was positively radiant after pulling in a second Labour seat in her area. This was 33-year-old John Lyons, a secondary school teacher in Ballymun, a soft-spoken modest man, who resembles a member of a boy band, albeit a rather shocked and tearful one. He loves his job, he says, and hasn’t begun to digest the idea of not returning to it today. But he’s obviously tougher than he looks.
All his life he has stepped up: the first of his family to stay on in secondary school, the first to do the Leaving Cert, the first to go to college – and now the first TD born and bred in Ballymun to represent Ballymun. Truly, moulds have been broken.