Search Results for 'becoming taoiseach'

“A week is a long time in politics,” former British prime minister Harold Wilson famously said. Four years even longer and in Mayo the change was a lot more dramatic than most would have expected from the last time they stood in the count centre in the Royal Theatre for a general election count. The blue surge over the country turned into a tidal wave in Mayo, with four of the five seats going to Fine Gael. The four Fine Gael candidates took 58.96 per cent of the first preference vote in the county, which translates into 48,170 first preference votes. That is an increase of 5.13 per cent from 2007 or 9,924 votes.