Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Hi there,
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest

Seanad General Election 2025 - University Panels

  • 09-12-2024 4:01pm
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,849 ✭✭✭


    This will be the final general election where we have the two siloed off panels for the NUI and Trinity graduates. Both will elect 3 senators each (next time there will be a single 6 member panel for all third level degree holders).

    • Nominations closed last Friday
    • Ballots go out at the end of December
    • Polls close on Jan 29th

    Nominees are as follows:

    I don't actually recognise any of the people on the NUI list apart from the 3 incumbents so I reckon they'll get reelected. It might be Ronan Mullen's final time too. He gets elected on the strength of a strong vote from Maynooth. That will be diluted in future elections.

    The interesting race will be for the open seat (due to David Norris retiring) on the TCD panel. The 2 incumbents (Lynn Ruane and Tom Clonan) will probably get reelected so there'll be a right battle on for that final seat. Lots of familiar names on that list including many who went for the by-election for Ivana Bacik's seat. I fancy Ossian Smyth for the seat as I think the TCD electorate may be more Green friendly and want to provide a counter-balance to the whacking that the great unwashed gave to that party in the recent Dail election. He's also not as divisive as Hazel Chu. Special shout out to Katerine Zappone for selflessly putting her name forward for another cushy government job. In a panel full of people with very high opinions of themselves she is in a league of her own.



«134

Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,830 ✭✭✭✭dulpit


    I'd love to see Mullen & McDowell get kicked to the kerb, but this undemocratic panel will return them again. And then I'll finally have an opportunity to vote for the Seanad next time around (I'm a graduate from an IT).

    These should still be opened up wider.

    What's the size of the electorate like here versus what the potential could be? I don't know anybody who has bothered to register as NUI grads…



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,849 ✭✭✭Brussels Sprout


    In 2020 the electorates for the 2 panels were:

    NUI: 112,206. Turnout was 34.1%

    TCD: ~65,000. Turnout was 23.1%

    I am not sure if those electorates comprise only of graduates who have registered. I'm eligible via a post-grad I did in an NUI university and assumed that I'd be registered automatically. That wasn't the case, as I realised in 2016 when I didn't have a vote. I went and registered after that and voted for the first time in 2020. Once you're on the register you get posted stuff from most of the candidates running up to the election and you also vote by postal ballot as well.

    When they open this franchise up to all degree holders then the potential electorate will be somewhere around 1.5-2 million I reckon.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 11,058 ✭✭✭✭Red Silurian


    Open to correction but I think they are opening it to all graduates of Universities (of which the former IT's are now Technical Universities), not just degree holders.

    That would include people with a Level 6 (certificate) and Level 7. Trades might also be considered but I am unsure of this

    Be interesting to see what happens when the electorate is more balanced



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,594 ✭✭✭pureza


    As a counterpoint,I am a UCD graduate and was registered for the Seanad elections automatically and have voted in 6 or 7 of them 😩

    Your post box is inundated with election literature in the weeks beforehand and your vote comes by registered post which you also send off in a pre paid registered post envelope



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,430 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato


    Got a letter yesterday from Aubrey McCarthy. Not one of the leaflets all candidates send out subsidised by the taxpayer, but a proper letter, in an A5 window envelope, and a nice glossy A4 leaflet too. Must be costing him/his supporters a fair whack.

    Never heard of him before but his schtick is that he set up a charity which makes him the last sort of person I'd vote for.

    It might be Ronan Mullen's final time too. He gets elected on the strength of a strong vote from Maynooth.

    We can but hope. The priest vote is going to be diluted by about eight times, at least in theory

    I'm partial to your abracadabra,
    I'm raptured by the joy of it all.



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,830 ✭✭✭✭dulpit


    Unless I'm mistaken the literature that is subsidised only covers the postage, the candidates still need to print their own stuff themselves.

    What's wrong with setting up a charity btw?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    The NUI panel is particularly awful this time. If you want to avoid Mullen and Mullen-alikes you need to tread incredibly carefully.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,849 ✭✭✭Brussels Sprout


    Strange that there aren't a few high profile failed Dail candidates on the NUI list as well.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Well, I consider McDowell to be a high profile failed Dáil candidate, but he took some time off before trying the NUI panel (and got in)



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 774 ✭✭✭csirl


    I think they should have retained the constituencies - added extra ones for the other universities. Dont like the idea of one constituency of 6. Likely end up like the rest of the Seanad i.e. members of mainstream parties.

    The Trinity constituency has returned a great variety parlimentarians of various parts of the political spectrum over the years - mainly independents - shame this is the last time for it.

    NUI one has always been uninspiring e.g. Mullen etc.



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    The constitution limits the university Senators to 6. The amendment to allow changing it from 3 NUI, 3 Trinity only allows to take them away from the existing 6.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,430 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato


    This isn't really the thread to get into the incredible cluster-f**k the Irish charity industry is

    The subsidised/free(?) literature is an A4 sheet folded into three, name and address printed on outside, no envelope

    I'm partial to your abracadabra,
    I'm raptured by the joy of it all.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,430 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato


    Don't recognise any of those names, who are the Mullen-alikes? (not that my vote is with NUI, just curious how they could possibly think there's more than one quota there for them)

    I'm partial to your abracadabra,
    I'm raptured by the joy of it all.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 595 ✭✭✭StormForce13


    Just had a look at his website: https://www.aubreymccarthy.com/

    It reveals that he's one of the most modest and unassuming Seanad candidates that I have ever encountered!

    Sadly, as a NUI graduate, I won't be able to help this man in his noble mission to nobble the insufferable Mrs. Patrick Costello, but I wish him the very best of luck!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,067 ✭✭✭Dick phelan


    Just looks like a bunch of people who couldn't get a Dail seat, Chu, Zappone Smyth O'Neill. Just a load of people desperately trying to get on the gravy train



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 23,512 ✭✭✭✭Esel
    Not Your Ornery Onager


    One person, one vote…

    We should not have only a small subset of the population voting in Seanad elections.

    Not your ornery onager



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,430 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato


    If every thicko gets one vote, surely I deserve more than one 😁

    I'm partial to your abracadabra,
    I'm raptured by the joy of it all.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 31,022 ✭✭✭✭AndrewJRenko


    Strange to see Zappone popping back up again, after being off the radar for three years, seems very unlikely that she'd get over the line.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,914 ✭✭✭StevenToast


    We cant have the mucksavages that didnt go to Trinners voting in our election..

    Fùck off knobs...

    "Don't piss down my back and tell me it's raining." - Fletcher



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 23,512 ✭✭✭✭Esel
    Not Your Ornery Onager


    You'll get to pick your position against the wall, comrade. That will be your only privilege.

    Not your ornery onager



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,144 ✭✭✭Doc07


    He called to my door last night. He had my house on a list of Trinity voters (I bought it from a retired Trinity Prof) He seemed like a nice chap but I had to break the news we were an NUI house now.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,144 ✭✭✭Doc07


    yes I’d be amazed if she was competitive in this , not due to her politics but more so she has no Trinity ‘presence or history’ that many would be familiar with , compared to Bacik for example in the past.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    I'd never heard of door to door canvassing for a Seanad election before (well, Independent candidates for the main panels absolutely do go visit Councillors - but not on a University panel). Makes sense though, if you notice a clump in an area it'd be quick enough to drop by everyone on the register.

    I've seen some - very little - postering in areas with high % of graduates; and even seen Ronán Mullen in Maynooth flyering years and years ago.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,830 ✭✭✭✭dulpit


    The failed Dáil candidates end up going for the panels instead sure. Well the party ones do anyway…



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Trinity panel has one Labour and two Green, one of which is an ex TD



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 36,430 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato


    Jesus. Really don't want to get callers to the door over this 😶

    I'm partial to your abracadabra,
    I'm raptured by the joy of it all.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,144 ✭✭✭Doc07


    which means they already knew/expected /were told they weren’t getting put on via the other panels or Taoiseach picks



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,740 ✭✭✭✭Marcusm


    even stranger perhaps for her to be a candidate on a panel for a university from which she does not hold a degree although I guess she taught there.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,740 ✭✭✭✭Marcusm


    Linda O’Shea Farren has handeluvwred literature for the local and Dial elections personally already. No canvassing but I have gone out to give it back to her (twice) with a reminder that no junk mail applies to her also!



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    No politician, ever, considers No Junk Mail to apply to them. They won't stop so unless going out makes you feel good, it's probably a waste of time.

    I've heard of people spending their own money to post stuff back with notes about the signs though, so this isn't even vaguely excessive



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 31,022 ✭✭✭✭AndrewJRenko


    God loves a trier.

    How long is she going to keep this up? She's never come within an asses roar of being elected.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 224 ✭✭scrabtom


    The general rule is to ignore No Junk Mail signs, however No Political Leaflets/Canvassing signs are usually adhered to.

    To be fair I don't really think political literature from candidates is junk mail. This stuff is important.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 224 ✭✭scrabtom




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 291 ✭✭peneau


    www.seanadvoter.ie



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,594 ✭✭✭pureza


    FYI

    Received this today,dated 9th December

    You have until Jan 23rd to get on the register for the 2030 elections if you are NUi,UCD in my case



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,740 ✭✭✭✭Marcusm


    Junk mail is anything which is not personally addressed to an occupant of the premises.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 742 ✭✭✭moon2


    The rules about junk mail do not apply to:

    • Material addressed to ‘the householder’, ‘the occupier’ or ‘the occupant’

    https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/consumer/phone-internet-tv-and-postal-services/stopping-junk-mail/

    While everyone would agree in spirit, in legal terms the name on the letter is irrelevant when it comes to junk mail classifications.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 224 ✭✭scrabtom


    Get yourself a no political literature sign and you won't have to have this argument anymore.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011




  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,181 ✭✭✭✭Geuze


    Will Dundalk IT have a vote next time? Or is it only TUs?

    Is it only graduates of level 8 programmes from IoTs / TUs?

    What about level 7 ordinary degrees?

    Or level 6?



  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    Dundalk is listed. Its pretty close to anywhere that ever awarded a degree.

    https://www.seanadvoter.ie/InstitutionsEN.shtml?0;25453776

    Bachelors, Masters and Doctorates are allowed. Level 7s are Bachelors, Level 8s are Bachelors (Hons).

    I've seen nothing to say they insist on Level 8 Bachelors, and they repeatedly list the excluded things as including National Certificates, Diplomas (L6s), Higher Diplomas (can be any level up to 9 but are special awards) and Honorary Doctorates.

    So we have to assume that Level 7 is allowed. Level 6 is definitely not.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,229 ✭✭✭✭Donald Trump


    Presumably there would have been some people with votes in two Seanad Constituencies previously? For example, a student who went to Trinity and then for whatever reason scored the bottom of their class and had to do a postgrad out in UCD later. Will they only get one vote now in the new single constituency?

    The idea of having one panel of 3 for Trinity Graduates and then one other panel of 3 for the NUI graduates was ridiculous anyway. Could they not have made it into a panel of 5 for the Trinity Graduates and then let all the others vote in one as a consolation prize?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,830 ✭✭✭✭dulpit


    Ignoring your poor attempt at humour by your thinly veiled snobbery, it is possible that somebody can vote in the trinity panel, the nui panel and the various vocational panels assuming they get elected. Theoretically if the Taoiseach of the day was a graduate of both Trinners and the NUI they'd be able to be involved in all senator areas (the 2 university panels, the vocational panels and the Taoiseach nominees)



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,229 ✭✭✭✭Donald Trump


    (CAO admission in the main depends on nothing more than examination results. Snobbery tends to exist more in the lower ranked universities such as UCD)

    Anyway, point being now that when amalgamated, such a hypothetical person can now only vote in one constituency



  • Moderators, Politics Moderators Posts: 41,927 Mod ✭✭✭✭Seth Brundle


    Mod: stop with the attempts at trolling. If you've nothing good to say, then don't say anything!



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,777 ✭✭✭Caquas


    Shane Ross, who held a Trinity seat for 29 years, excoriates the Seanad electoral process. He doesn't exempt the University seats

    I benefited from a process that is shamelessly anachronistic. The university seats were dismissed by detractors as a “rotten borough” — with some justification. The same constituencies will operate in the current election, but they will, supposedly, be reformed in future to include other third-level graduates.

    Is Seanad Éireann the most undemocratic Chamber of Parliament in the European Union? Certainly so, if measured by the size of the electorate for most of its seats. Not to mention the 11 Senators who are elected by no one.

    After promising reform when threatened with abolition by referendum in 2013, nothing was done until this year and then only because the Supreme Court put a gun to the Government's head over the University seats and another referendum whose result had been studiously ignored for 45(!) years. The Government passed up another opportunity for wider reform and simply threw open the six University seats to all graduates. Who knows what nutters will get elected by the tiny minority of all graduates who will bother to vote next time?

    https://www.independent.ie/opinion/shane-ross-secret-scheming-back-stabbing-and-flattery-help-fill-those-senate-seats/a1275882412.html



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,830 ✭✭✭✭dulpit


    I was going to say the house of Lords is worse, but spotted you mentioned the EU. It's pretty bad here alright...



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,975 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    The people who promised reform:

    a: never intended to or

    b: never had the power to

    It was never going to happen; they lied to retain the status quo as that was the only thing on the table



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,777 ✭✭✭Caquas


    And they are secure in the knowledge that there'll never be another referendum on this.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,282 ✭✭✭✭astrofool


    Barring revolution, the Dáil would never cede enough power to make the Seanad in any way useful, it would be political suicide, but we missed our chance to get rid of it to give the government of the time a black eye.

    If it becomes more representative, it just becomes a mini-Dáil which would have the same proportions and whip systems and thus be a rubber-stamping ground. If somehow it did have power and wasn't representative it would cause even less legislation to go through (we have seen in the US that there is very little desire for today's politicians to take a bi-partisan approach, voters don't vote them back in).



  • Advertisement
Advertisement