The big story from Fingal East was Alan Farrell the chairman of the Fine Gael parliamentary party losing his seat.
Fingal East is a new three-seat constituency carved out of the former five-seat Dublin Fingal area.
The general expectation was that three incumbent TDs, Mr Farrell, Duncan Smith of Labour and Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien of Fianna Fáil would all be safely returned.
This view was re-enforced after the disappointing Sinn Féin performance in the local elections in the summer when Ann Graves, who had been expected to run for the party in Fingal East, lost her seat on the local authority – she was later co-opted back on to replace a colleague who was ill.
However, political observers in Fingal maintain that a stronger-than-anticipated Sinn Féin performance as well as Social Democrat candidate Joan Hopkins taking support in his main area in Malahide left Mr Farrell struggling.
Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien secured close to 40 per cent also in Malahide area as well as significant votes in Kinsealy and Portmarnock.
Mr O’Brien topped the poll and was eventually elected on the seventh count.
The Labour Party has traditionally had a presence in the Dáil in north Dublin and was delighted to see Duncan Smith hold on.
But for Fine Gael, the warning signs that were there in the local elections when the party lost a council seat in Malahide. This heralded the outcome in the general election.
Having had two seats in the old Dublin North up to 2016, the party has no representation in the Dáil for areas such as Malahide and Portmarnock which would once have been considered a heartland.
