Source: Cianan Brennan/TheJournal.ie

MINISTER FOR DRUGS Aodhán Ó Riordáin has lost his seat in Dublin Bay North.

The Labour TD has just been eliminated after the 15th count in the constituency labelled the ‘group of death’ – there were just five seats up grabs and a field of 20 candidates.

Independents Tommy Broughan and Finian McGrath and Sinn Féin’s Denise Mitchell have all taken seats.

Averil Power and John Lyons were eliminated late last night and their votes distributed in the first count of the day.

Ó Riordáin said that Power’s transfers were not as friendly as he team would have hoped for. Richard Bruton, and Seán Haughey – son of Charlie – were elected during earlier counts.

The result will come as a major blow for both Ó Riordáin, who is viewed as a potential future party leader, and Labour, who now need Willie Penrose to take a seat in Longford-Westmeath in order to reach seven seats.

Seven seats automatically entitles the party to speaking rights in the Dáil.

In the end, after a marathon count, Ó Riordáin was over 800 votes short of independent Finian McGrath, who took the fifth seat.

He took just 400 over AAA-PBP candidate John Lyons’ 8,400 transfers.

Speaking afterwards, Ó Riordáin told RTÉ’s News at One that he “believed in the power of politics” and “believed in the Labour Party”.

He said that the party had “been on the back foot from day one”

“The point of politics is to serve. You should realise every day that you’re there to serve,” he advised new TDs.