Limerick City had one of the lowest turnouts at the 2024 general election

A party needs 21 of the 40 seats to outvote the rest. None has that: Fine Gael is largest with 13. None of the 31 councils has a single-party majority. Fianna Fáil is second with 10 seats. The councillors elect a cathaoirleach each June to chair the council for a year; no open national list names them.

The 31 councils of Ireland

Seats by party as elected, largest party named; this council first.

Local and general election results 2024: Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage (CC BY-SA 4.0); areas matched to towns by TownRatings from Tailte Éireann boundaries and CSO Census 2022 Small Areas (CC BY 4.0).

Who to ask

Green: the council. Gold: a government department or one of its agencies. Grey: another public body.

1. 1

   The Limerick City West local electoral areaLimerick City West · 7 members
   Daniel ButlerDan McSweeneyJoe LeddinAbul Kalam Azad TalukderFergus KilcoyneMaria DonoghueElisa O'Donovan
2. 2

   Limerick City and County Council40 councillors from 6 local electoral areas
   Fine Gael 13 · Fianna Fáil 10 · Independent 5 · Sinn Féin 3 · Labour Party 3 · Independent Ireland 2 · Social Democrats 2 · Aontú 1 · Green Party 1
3. 3

   Mayor of Limerick City and CountyLimerick City and County · elected June 2024
   John Moran
4. 4

   Dáil ÉireannLimerick City · 4 members
   Conor SheehanKieran O'DonnellMaurice QuinlivanWillie O'Dea

Party colours are neutral on purpose: they tell parties apart and aren’t the parties’ own. TDs: Houses of the Oireachtas Open Data (Oireachtas PSI Licence, CC BY 4.0).

Dock’s councillors, one by one

6 of the 7 were sitting councillors who were re-elected; 1 weren’t on the council before the election.

Seats by party in each of Limerick City and County Council’s 6 local electoral areas

Each of the local electoral areas elects 3 to 7 councillors by single transferable vote: voters number the candidates in order, a candidate who reaches the quota is elected, and spare votes and those of the lowest candidate pass to the next preference. A councillor who leaves is replaced by co-option, usually from the same party, so the names can change without an election.

Councillors: same source as Who’s in charge, above.

12 of the 40 councillors are women, 30%; across all 31 councils the share is 26%. 29 sat on the council before the election and 11 are new to it.

The council: same source as Who’s in charge, above.

Turnout was 48.3%, 12,365 of 25,596 registered voters: the 98th-highest of 166 local electoral areas (all of them: 49.4%). With 12,158 valid votes and 7 seats the quota was 1,520; the count ran to 12 rounds. Daniel Butler (Fine Gael) and Dan McSweeney (Fine Gael) passed the quota on first preferences; transfers filled the other 5. Maria Donoghue (Independent) took the last seat with 1,252 votes at the final count, 186 more than Esther Aherne (Independent Ireland), on 1,066.

How Dock voted: same source as Who’s in charge, above.

90 candidates stood for 40 seats on Limerick City and County Council in June 2024, 2.3 for each seat. Turnout across the council was 51.9%, the 16th-highest of 31 councils. Fine Gael elected 13 of its 18 candidates. 27 of the 90 candidates were women (30%; 31% across the country), and 22 stood without a party. Across all 31 councils, 2,172 candidates stood for 949 seats, 2.3 for each.

Local elections: same source as Who’s in charge, above.

TDs as the Oireachtas lists them today, with any office they hold; a by-election or a change of party shows here, the 2024 count below does not change.

First preferences in Limerick City, November 2024

42,490 of 77,735 registered voters turned out, 54.7%: the 40th-highest of 43 Dáil constituencies (all of them: 59.7%). The quota was 8,435: 42,174 valid votes for 4 seats, counted over 15 rounds. No candidate reached the quota on first preferences: transfers filled every seat. Conor Sheehan (Labour Party) was 7th on first preferences and elected on transfers, ahead of Dee Ryan (Fianna Fáil), 4th on first preferences. Conor Sheehan (Labour Party) took the last seat with 6,395 votes at the final count, 598 more than Elisa O'Donovan (Social Democrats), on 5,797.

Dáil Éireann: same source as Who’s in charge, above.

Leaving out the HAP programme, that is the 15th-highest of the 31 councils per resident; across all of them it is €1,551. The budget is up 2% on 2025, when it was €923.9M. Limerick City and County Council also runs the HAP Shared Services Centre, which pays the landlords of Housing Assistance Payment tenants for every council: €639.8M of its 2026 budget.

Commercial rates on businesses pay for 7% of the budget. Its annual rate on valuation is 0.2965, the 15th-highest of the 31 councils that rate on revalued property. The Local Property Tax brings in another 2%.

Budgets: Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Local Authority Annual Budgets 2025 and 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), revenue account before inter-authority contributions are netted; residents: CSO Census 2022 (CC BY 4.0).

Limerick City and County Council has 40 councillors for 209,536 residents: about 5,240 each, the 9th-highest of 31 councils. The range runs from 9,410 residents per councillor on Dublin City to 1,960 on Leitrim County.

Seats: local elections 2024 (Department of Housing, CC BY-SA 4.0); residents: CSO Census 2022 (CC BY 4.0).