Irish general election: Counting begins

The counting of votes in the Irish general election has begun, with exit polls showing a close race between the three major political parties.

Figures from Friday’s exit polls show Sinn Féin Slightly ahead of Fine Gael and Fine Gael in the first preference vote.

After the constituency reorganization, 174 Teachtaí Dála (TD) are expected to be elected, up from 160 in 2020.

There are currently 43 districts in the House of Representatives (up from 39 in 2020), and 3 to 5 TDs will be elected from each district.

One seat in the House of Representatives belongs to the Ceann Comhairle (Speaker), so 88 TDs is the number required to obtain a majority.

More than 680 candidates are vying for the remaining 173 seats.

Counting began at 09:00 local time in more than 40 centers across the country, with the first results expected in the late afternoon.

Figures released at 22:00 local time showed that Sinn Féin received 21.1% of the first preference vote, Fine Gael received 21%, and Fine Gael came in third with 19.5% of the vote.

It also showed that 20% of second preference votes went to Fine Gael and Fine Gael, with Sinn Féin receiving 17%.

The exit poll, conducted by Ipsos B&A for RTÉ, The Irish Times, TG4 and Trinity College Dublin, is based on 5,018 completed interviews outside the polling station.

Its margin of error is 1.4%.

The results also show that the support rate between the Labor Party, the Green Party and the Social Democrats is less than 2%, and the competition between the small parties is very fierce.

In the 2020 Irish general election, Sinn Féin received 24.53% of the first preference vote, Fine Gael received 22.18%, and Fine Gael received 20.86%.

If exit poll numbers reflect the final results, support for independent candidates appears to have declined, from 15% in 2020 to 12%.

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If the exit polls are correct, Sinn Féin is expected to win the popular vote for the second time in a row.

But just like 2020, it has no clear path to power.

Outgoing coalition partners Fine Gael and Fine Gael are well-positioned, with the support of smaller parties, to gain the numbers needed to return to government seats.

If the polls are correct, the couple could get 75 to 80 seats, which would put them just shy of the 88 seats needed for a majority.

Sinn Féin hopes it will perform better than the polls suggest, as it did in 2020.

But that may not be enough to form a coalition of left-leaning parties outside Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil.

BBC News NI’s Aoife Moore in Dublin

Early statistics predict some government ministers will be uneasy.

While not all boxes have been opened, trends are starting to emerge.

In Wicklow, which has four seats, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly is fifth.

Health has been a hot topic in the campaign as waiting lists continue to grow.

Taoiseach Simon Harris is in the same constituency and leads the early count.

In Dublin mid-west, children’s minister Roderick O’Gorman of the Green Party has run into trouble at an early stage and is currently in sixth place.

O’Gorman is in the unenviable position of being responsible for the integration and accommodation of asylum seekers – an issue that the current government is struggling to deal with amid a far-right misinformation campaign and a lack of refugee beds.

Meanwhile, Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald is likely to take the first seat in the Dublin Central constituency.

Social Democrat Gary Gannon and Fine Gael minister Paschal Donohoe’s seats also look safe.

The final seat looks likely to be a close race between Labor senator Mary Sherlock and independent candidate Gerald Hatch.

The Republic of Ireland elects its government using a system of proportional representation, known as “proportional representation”. single transferable voting right.

Voters rank the candidates in the constituency in order of preference, and candidates must reach a certain number of votes to be elected.

The counting of votes is carried out in multiple rounds.

Each vote will initially be credited to first choice.

Once a candidate receives the required number of votes, they are elected and any remaining votes marked as first preference are transferred to the second-ranked preference.

Votes continue to be transferred to the next available preference until all seats in the constituency are filled by candidates who have met the quota.

Once all seats are filled, the next phase of the process will begin, the task of forming a new government.

Because of the voting system, counting can sometimes last for days and forming a government can take even longer.

It was four months after the last general election in 2020 that Fine Gael, Fine Gael and the Greens agreed to form a government.

Sinn Féin has emerged as the main opposition party and both Fine Gael and Fine Gael have ruled them out as potential coalition partners.

The first session of the new Dáil (lower house of parliament) will be held on December 18, but coalition negotiations are unlikely to be completed by then.

The government will be formally formed when the House of Representatives votes to appoint a new Taoiseach, but this is not expected to happen before 2025.