W ex ford’ s first lady senator elected

September 1981

Fine Gael councillor Mrs Deirdre Bolger, Millmount House, Gorey, made history on Friday of last week when she was elected a senator in the Seanad Elections. She is the Gorey area’s first senator since the foundation of the State just 60 years ago, and Co. Wexford’s first lady senator.

Mrs Bolger’s election on the Industrial and Commercial panel of the Seanad now means that north Wexford now has three representatives in the Oireachtas. She joins TDs Michael D’Arcy, who is Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, and Fianna Fáil’s Lorcan Allen, who was a Minister of State in the last Government.

The nine seats on the Industrial and Commercial panel were the most fiercely contested in the entire Seanad Election. There were a total of 39 candidates and it took a marathon of 28 counts before even the first results were declared.

Mrs Bolger polled 32 votes on the first count and got the ninth highest number of first preference votes. The quota was 88 and the poll was headed by Ruairí Quinn, the former Labour TD, with 81 votes. Mrs Bolger was eventually the sixth person elected, on the 31st count.

Senator Bolger said it was a gruelling campaign but she is delighted with the result. She thanked all who supported her, and paid special tribute to her husband, David, the well-known Gorey and Ferns businessman and farmer, who had managed her campaign.