Election battlegrounds #LE19 : Newry

Newry, Mourne and Down Council is one district where the SDLP will be fighting hard to hold their seats. Sinn Féin are confident that the tallysheets from recent electoral outings in the underlying constituencies (South Down and Newry & Armagh) will help them increase their seats from 14 to the 17-21 range.

In Newry there are nine candidates chasing six seats.

In 2014 the SDLP stood too many candidates and Sinn Féin too few. Hence this time around the SDLP have reduced their runners from 4 to 2 and Sinn Féin has increased  from 3 to 4. 

Sinn Féin’s 4 are being led by council veteran Charlie Casey. He is joined by sitting councillors Valerie Harte and Liz Kimmins and newcomer Sarah Jane McAllister.

The SDLP are fielding sitting councillors Gary Stokes and Michael Savage. Stokes was first elected here in 2005 whilst Savage was co-opted in 2017.

In 2014 Sinn Féin received 3.6 quotas and the SDLP 2.2 quotas so the SDLP cannot afford any slippage.

Independent Davy Hyland took a seat ahead of the 2 SDLP councillors here in 2014 and made quota comfortably on the third count. On Counts 2 and 3 Hyland got 251 votes from the Sinn Féin surplus compared to 200 for the SDLP.

This time however Hyland is standing down and has nominated Gavin Malone to be the Independent runner on the ticket here. 

Ricky McGaffin is standing for the UUP but there is no unionist seat here and his transfers will be important to the SDLP.

Helena Young is the first Alliance candidate to stand in Newry for 22 years and is one of 7 candidates Alliance is standing across all the council DEAs. With a good Assembly performance in South Down last time out and the first green shoots of growth in Newry and Armagh Alliance clearly see here as a potential area for growth.

The reasonably safe seats are 3 SF, 1 SDLP and 1 Independent. The last seat will be between Sinn Féin’s 4th and the SDLP’s 2nd. Sinn Féin’s balancing will be crucial here and the SDLP cannot afford to lose too many first preferences to Alliance either.

Daithi McKay

Daithí McKay is a former MLA that introduced the Assembly’s first carrier bag levy legislation. He was the Chairperson of the Climate Coalition and was involved in both the legislative work and the grassroots campaign to secure the Climate Change Act 2022. Based west of the Bann he is also a member of the Strabane Greenways group.

Twitter : @daithimckay