The 2009 European Parliament election in Ireland was the Irish component of the

2009 European Parliament election The 2009 European Parliament election was held in the 27 member states of the European Union (EU) between 4 and 7 June 2009. A total of 736 Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) were elected to represent some 500 million Europeans, making th ...

and was held on Friday, 5 June 2009, coinciding with the 2009 local elections. Two by-elections ( Dublin South and Dublin Central) were also held on the same day.

National and regional summaries

The governing

Fianna Fáil Fianna Fáil (, ; meaning 'Soldiers of Destiny' or 'Warriors of Fál'), officially Fianna Fáil – The Republican Party ( ga, audio=ga-Fianna Fáil.ogg, Fianna Fáil – An Páirtí Poblachtánach), is a conservative and Christia ...

party lost one MEP and a significant share of the vote, in line with the day's other election results.

Fine Gael Fine Gael (, ; English: "Family (or Tribe) of the Irish") is a liberal-conservative and Christian-democratic political party in Ireland. Fine Gael is currently the third-largest party in the Republic of Ireland in terms of members of Dáil É ...

increased its national vote share but lost a seat. The Labour Party, which increased its delegation from one MEP to three, was the only major party to make seat gains.

Sinn Féin Sinn Féin ( , ; en, " eOurselves") is an Irish republican and democratic socialist political party active throughout both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The original Sinn Féin organisation was founded in 1905 by Arthur Gr ...

lost its only MEP in the Republic of Ireland, and the

Socialist Party Socialist Party is the name of many different political parties around the world. All of these parties claim to uphold some form of socialism, though they may have very different interpretations of what "socialism" means. Statistically, most of ...

won a seat for the first time. One independent MEP lost her seat. The

Green Party A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence. Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation f ...

's vote was halved, and the pan-European

Libertas Libertas ( Latin for 'liberty' or 'freedom', ) is the Roman goddess and personification of liberty. She became a politicised figure in the Late Republic, featured on coins supporting the populares faction, and later those of the assassins of ...

party, based in Ireland, also failed to make a breakthrough. In

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...

, Gay Mitchell of Fine Gael and Proinsias De Rossa of Labour were re-elected, while Joe Higgins of the Socialist Party defeated the incumbent Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin MEPs to take the third seat. In the

East East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fac ...

constituency,

Mairead McGuinness Mairead McGuinness (born 13 June 1959) is an Irish politician serving as the European Commissioner for Financial Stability, Financial Services and the Capital Markets Union since October 2020. A member of Fine Gael, she previously served as F ...

of Fine Gael and Liam Aylward of Fianna Fáil were re-elected. Nessa Childers of Labour took the vacant final seat. North-West re-elected independent ALDE MEP Marian Harkin and Jim Higgins of Fine Gael, while the Fianna Fáil seat was retained by former MEP Pat "the Cope" Gallagher. In

South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...

, Brian Crowley of Fianna Fáil was re-elected, Seán Kelly won a seat from his Fine Gael colleague

Colm Burke Colm Burke (born 17 January 1957) is an Irish Fine Gael politician who has been a Teachta Dála (TD) for the Cork North-Central since the 2020 general election. He previously served as a Senator for the Industrial and Commercial Panel from 20 ...

, and Labour's Alan Kelly took the last seat in a tight contest between him,

's Toiréasa Ferris and the incumbent

Independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independe ...

Kathy Sinnott in the final count.

Constituency changes

In accordance with the terms of the

Treaty of Nice The Treaty of Nice was signed by European leaders on 26 February 2001 and came into force on 1 February 2003. It amended the Maastricht Treaty (or the Treaty on European Union) and the Treaty of Rome (or the Treaty establishing the European ...

, the number of MEPs from Ireland in the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the Legislature, legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven Institutions of the European Union, institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and in ...

was reduced from 13 to 12 for this election. The Dublin constituency was reduced from 4 seats to 3, and the counties of

Longford Longford () is the county town of County Longford in Ireland. It has a population of 10,008 according to the 2016 census. It is the biggest town in the county and about one third of the county's population lives there. Longford lies at the mee ...

and Westmeath were transferred from the East constituency to the North-West constituency. The election was conducted under the

single transferable vote Single transferable vote (STV) is a multi-winner electoral system in which voters cast a single vote in the form of a ranked-choice ballot. Voters have the option to rank candidates, and their vote may be transferred according to alternate p ...

in Ireland; the only other constituencies to elect their MEPs under STV are

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

and

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label=Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is #Descriptions, variously described as ...

, with the rest of Europe using variants of the list system.

Results

MEPs elected

Voting details

References

External links

European Elections 2009 in IrelandElectionsIreland.org – 2009 European Parliament (Ireland) election results
{{DEFAULTSORT:European Parliament Election, 2009 (Ireland) European European

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...

European Parliament elections in the Republic of Ireland