Munster (European Parliament constituency)

Munster European Parliament constituency
Shown within Ireland
Created	1979
Dissolved	2004
MEP(s)	4 (1994–2004), 5 (1979–1994)
Member State	Ireland
Source(s)	[1]

Munster was a constituency of the European Parliament in Ireland between 1979 and 2004 based on the historic province of Munster. It elected 5 Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) in the elections of 1979, 1984 and 1989 and 4 MEPs in the 1994 and 1999 elections. For the 2004 election, County Clare was moved to the new North-West constituency with the remainder becoming the new South constituency.

MEPs

Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) for Munster 1979–2009
Key to parties   FF = Fianna Fáil ·   FG = Fine Gael ·   Ind = Independent ·   Lab = Labour Party ·   PD = Progressive Democrats
Parl.	Election	Member (Party)		Member (Party)		Member (Party)		Member (Party)		Member (Party)
1st	1979[1]		T. J. Maher (Ind)		Tom O'Donnell (FG)		Eileen Desmond (Lab)		Jerry Cronin[2] (FF)		Noel Davern (FF)
	1981[3]						Seán Treacy (Lab)
2nd	1984[4]						Tom Raftery (FG)		Sylvester Barrett (FF)		Gene Fitzgerald (FF)
3rd	1989[5]				John Cushnahan (FG)		Pat Cox (PD)		Paddy Lane (FF)
4th	1994[6]		Brian Crowley (FF)				Pat Cox (Ind)		Gerry Collins (FF)	4 seats from 1994
5th	1999[7]
6th	2004	Constituency abolished. See South

Note: The columns in this table are used only for presentational purposes, and no significance should be attached to the order of columns. For details of the order in which seats were won at each election, see the detailed results of that election.

1999 election

1999 European Parliament election: Munster[7]
Party		Candidate	% 1st Pref	Count 1	Count 2	Count 3	Count 4	Count 5	Count 6
	Fianna Fáil	Brian Crowley	34.4	154,195
	Fianna Fáil	Gerry Collins	18.5	83,106	117,783
	Independent	Pat Cox	14.3	63,954	76,203	85,257	88,357	95,004
	Fine Gael	John Cushnahan	10.3	46,100	49,009	50,496	51,483	53,497	78,232
	Labour Party	Paula Desmond	6.3	28,270	34,002	36,884	40,746	46,887	52,831
	Fine Gael	Jim Corr	7.0	31,363	35,026	37,556	38,693	40,669
	Sinn Féin	Martin Ferris	6.5	29,060	31,783	34,435	36,534
	Green Party	Ben Nutty	2.3	10,257	12,330	13,643
	Natural Law	Stewart Luck	0.3	1,267	1,602	1,897
	Independent	Denis Riordan	0.2	1,007	1,125	1,268
Electorate: 823,008   Valid: 448,579   Spoilt: 13,724 (2.9%)   Quota: 89,716   Turnout: 462,303 (56.2%)

All sitting MEPs were re-elected.

1994 election

1994 European Parliament election: Munster[6]
Party		Candidate	1st Pref	%	Seat	Count
	Fianna Fáil	Brian Crowley	84,463	23.2	1	1
	Fianna Fáil	Gerry Collins	49,677	13.6	2	9
	Fine Gael	John Cushnahan	36,906	10.1	3	12
	Independent	Pat Cox	27,920	7.7	4	12
	Progressive Democrats	Desmond O'Malley	31,674	8.7
	Fine Gael	Tom Raftery	31,250	8.6
	Labour Party	Jim Kemmy	25,486	7.0
	Independent	Nora Bennis	18,424	5.1
	Fianna Fáil	Paddy Lane	19,369	5.3
	Democratic Left	Kathleen Lynch	15,573	4.3
	Green Party	Dan Boyle	10,033	2.8
	Workers' Party	Martin O'Regan	6,270	1.7
	Sinn Féin	Kieran McCarthy	5,171	1.4
	Natural Law	Stewart Luck	890	0.2
	Independent	Conor Moloney	858	0.2
	Independent	Denis Riordan	607	0.2
Electorate: 755,176   Valid: 364,571   Spoilt: 5,319 (1.4%)   Quota: 72,915   Turnout: 369,890 (49.0%)

The constituency lost a seat and T. J. Maher and Gene Fitzgerald retired. Pat Cox resigned from the Progressive Democrats (PD) but succeeded in narrowly beating the PD leader Desmond O'Malley for the last seat.

1989 election

1989 European Parliament election: Munster[5]
Party		Candidate	1st Pref	%	Seat	Count
	Progressive Democrats	Pat Cox	85,558	17.3	1	1
	Fianna Fáil	Gene Fitzgerald	64,139	13.0	2	9
	Independent	T. J. Maher	55,499	11.2	3	10
	Fine Gael	John Cushnahan	43,326	8.8	4	10
	Fianna Fáil	Paddy Lane	41,152	8.3	5	10
	Labour Party	Eileen Desmond	29,979	6.1
	Fine Gael	Tom Raftery	43,528	8.8
	Fianna Fáil	Jackie Fahey	37,290	7.5
	Independent	Patrick Ryan	30,934	6.3
	Workers' Party	Joe Sherlock	26,828	5.4
	Independent	Joe Noonan	15,975	3.2
	Labour Party	Michael Ferris	13,843	2.8
	Independent	George Salter Townshend	2,577	0.5
	Independent	William O'Shea	2,011	0.4
	Independent	Abbey of the Holy Cross Fitzsimons	1,794	0.4
Electorate: 703,913   Valid: 494,433   Spoilt: 10,786 (2.1%)   Quota: 82,406   Turnout: 505,219 (71.8%)

Tom Raftery of Fine Gael lost his seat to Pat Cox of the Progressive Democrats.

1984 election

1984 European Parliament election: Munster[4]
Party		Candidate	1st Pref	%	Seat	Count
	Independent	T. J. Maher	55,079	16.1	1	3
	Fine Gael	Tom O'Donnell	53,832	15.7	2	5
	Fine Gael	Tom Raftery	44,236	12.9	3	6
	Fianna Fáil	Sylvester Barrett	47,622	13.9	4	7
	Fianna Fáil	Gene Fitzgerald	43,036	12.6	5	7
	Fianna Fáil	Noel Davern	42,863	12.5
	Labour Party	Eileen Desmond	26,162	7.6
	Workers' Party	Joe Sherlock	17,304	5.1
	Sinn Féin	Richard Behal	12,829	3.7
Electorate: 691,076   Valid: 342,963   Spoilt: 6,216 (1.8%)   Quota: 57,161   Turnout: 349,179 (50.5%)

Eileen Desmond (substituted by Seán Treacy in 1981) lost the Labour Party seat to Fine Gael, while Noel Davern lost his seat to his Fianna Fáil running mates.

1979 election

1979 European Parliament election: Munster[1]
Party		Candidate	1st Pref	%	Seat	Count
	Independent	T. J. Maher	86,208	20.0	1	1
	Fine Gael	Tom O'Donnell	46,820	10.9	2	8
	Labour Party	Eileen Desmond[3]	53,614	12.5	3	8
	Fianna Fáil	Jerry Cronin[2]	43,439	10.1	4	9
	Fianna Fáil	Noel Davern	37,647	8.7	5	9
	Fianna Fáil	Michael Herbert	34,034	7.9
	Fine Gael	Alan Dukes	21,510	5.0
	Fianna Fáil	Timothy O'Connor	29,595	6.9
	Fine Gael	Jim O'Keeffe	25,664	6.0
	Fine Gael	John Blair	21,615	5.0
	Fianna Fáil	Seán French	16,655	3.9
	Sinn Féin (Workers' Party)	Michael Dunphy	11,526	2.7
	Independent	Michael B Crowe	2,268	0.5
Electorate: 641,625   Valid: 430,595   Spoilt: 14,597 (3.3%)   Quota: 71,766   Turnout: 445,192 (69.4%)

References

1. ^ ^{a b} "1979 European Parliament election – Munster constituency". ElectionsIreland.org. http://www.electionsireland.org/result.cfm?election=1979E&cons=527. Retrieved 22 March 2009. 
2. ^ ^{a b} Jerry Cronin resigned on 23 May 1984 and his seat was vacant at dissolution.
3. ^ ^{a b} Eileen Desmond resigned on 7 July 1981 and was substituted by Seán Treacy (LAB / PES) on 9 July 1981.
4. ^ ^{a b} "1984 European Parliament election – Munster constituency". ElectionsIreland.org. http://www.electionsireland.org/result.cfm?election=1984E&cons=527. Retrieved 22 March 2009. 
5. ^ ^{a b} "1989 European Parliament election – Munster constituency". ElectionsIreland.org. http://www.electionsireland.org/result.cfm?election=1989E&cons=527. Retrieved 22 March 2009. 
6. ^ ^{a b} "1994 European Parliament election – Munster constituency". ElectionsIreland.org. http://www.electionsireland.org/result.cfm?election=1994E&cons=527. Retrieved 22 March 2009. 
7. ^ ^{a b} "1999 European Parliament election – Munster constituency". ElectionsIreland.org. http://www.electionsireland.org/result.cfm?election=1999E&cons=527. Retrieved 22 March 2009.