Election 2024 live updates: Stephen Donnelly loses seat as count enters final stretch

It is worth noting that while a government made up of Fine Gael and Fianna Fail is not the most likely outcome of the general election, the big winners are the Labour Party and the Social Democrats which will both be returning to Leinster House as considerably stronger forces. The Green Party which will have only one seat – leader Roderic O’Gorman – have suffered the heaviest of losses.
Miriam Lord’s excellent piece on the counting in the RDS is a must read this morning.
According to Fintan O’Toole, it would be a silly exaggeration to call any general election a non-event.
But in this case the overstatement would be slight. The things that did not happen seem a lot more significant than those that did. The outcome is negatively charged in five different ways, he writes.
Amid signs of wariness in both Labour and the Social Democrats about joining a Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael coalition, newly elected Independent TDs have been declaring their willingness to support a new government. Our politics team have the story.
When it comes to what to watch out for this morning, there are two of five seats filled in Kildare-North with the 11th count set to start at 9am.
In Louth there are also two of five seats filled with the 18th count to start again at 10am.
In Tipperary North one of three seats has been filled and a recount starts this morning.
Just one of five seats has been filled in Cavan Monaghan and it all cranks up again there at 1pm.
And finally there is also a recount coming in Cork North Central.
Looking at the bigger picture, Fianna Fáil will be the largest party with 43 seats secured already. Sinn Féin are currently on 36 while Fine Gael are also on 36.
The Social Democrats have 11 seats, while Labour is on nine, while 23 candidates under the banner of Independent/Others have been elected.
What all that means in terms of government formation is that Sinn Féin can’t really form part of the next Government without the support of one of the two other biggest parties.
The big news over night was Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly losing his Dáil seat after being eliminated in Wicklow. Taoiseach Simon Harris’s running mate Edward Timmins was deemed elected at 5.25am without reaching the quota after benefiting enormously from a huge surplus from Harris, who topped the poll with more than 5,000 votes to spare.
Earlier in the day Donnelly said a combination of a strong “Government vote” for Mr Harris and the loss of a seat from the four-seat constituency had dented his chances.
“We knew Simon would take a huge vote – a Government vote, if you like – in the constituency. It was strong actually, but when you’re sharing a constituency and a hometown with a taoiseach and moving from a five-seater to a four-seater – when you put those two things together, it obviously creates a lot of pressure,” he said.
Are we there yet? Are we there yet? No, no we are not. There is a ways to go yet before we will know the exact make up of the next Dáil. At the time of writing – shortly after 7am – there are just 13 seats in to be filled with counting (and re-counting) set to continue in five constituencies.