Willie O'Dea back on familiar territory as leader of the pack in Limerick City

WILLIE O’Dea was back in familiar territory over the weekend, heading the poll in Limerick City.

And once he is sworn into Dail Eireann, the 72-year-old will become the Father of the House, following the elimination of Fine Gael’s Bernard Durkan, 79, in Kildare North on Monday.

And if he serves out this five-year term in Dail Eireann, he will move to becoming the member with the third-longest service in Leinster House with 47 years.

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He’d still need another term-and-a-bit to surpass the longest-serving Dail deputy - Paddy Smith, who spent almost 54 years representing Cavan.

Mr O’Dea batted away questions from reporters on how much longer he will continue to contest elections, having first been returned in February 1982.

“If a week is a long time in politics, five years must be a complete eternity,” he said.

Asked how he keeps himself going, he added: “I like helping people out. If people come to me with a fairly intractable problem, I try to find a solution and go the extra mile. I don't always succeed of course, but sometimes I do, and I get great personal satisfaction from that.”

The Fianna Fail veteran had to wait until the sixth count to be re-elected, following a transfer from eliminated The Irish People candidate Dean Quinn.

He passed the quota of 8,435 with a surplus of just 88 votes, which went undistributed for a number of counts.

This was because it was decreed that they would not make a material difference to the progress of the race for the top four seats in the City.

Mr O’Dea is no stranger to coming first in the constituency formerly known as Limerick East. His maiden polltopper experience was in 1989, and he repeated the feat in 1992, 1997, 2002, 2007 - when he got the second highest vote in the country of 19,082 - 2016 and now.

His eventual vote of 8,520 at this election is down even from the 9,424 he got when Fianna Fail were at their lowest ebb at the 2011 election held following the global financial crash.

And it’s the first time that when he’s led the pack, he’s not been elected on the first count.

Although it must be noted that turnout was down at this election, something Mr O’Dea has noted as a concern.