Julie Helen: 'I'll use my vote...but I still don't know how'

As the presidential election looms on Friday, it is the first time ever I have had a feeling that maybe I shouldn’t vote.

Maybe it’s not even really that I shouldn’t vote, but that I’m still undecided and I don’t know how I want to use my precious vote.

Don’t fret though, I will vote when it comes down to it. I wouldn’t be able to show my face at home if I didn’t cast a vote.

In our house, democracy is important and playing our part is important so I will need to buck up and make a decision. People fought and died so I could vote, and also there are plenty of disabled people across the country who won’t have appropriate access to a polling station because they are not all properly accessible, or the transport in their area is not accessible to them, even in 2025, so there are people who won’t make it out to cast their vote. I can go, I can ask for help to go, and I will get the help I need so I will make the effort.

There will be three people on the ballot paper. Jim Gavin, who was the Fianna Fáil candidate who withdrew after the ballots were finalised, so his name will still be there. There are some considering voting for him to spoil their vote. His votes will be counted and if, by some miracle, he did win, and declined to take the position, it could lead to another election. In that instance, we have no guarantee that there would be different candidates or any better outcome.

There is a process behind getting this far in getting a name on the ballot paper in the first place. Four city or county councils could support a candidate for nomination or at least 20 TDs and senators could put their names to a nomination. So the two candidates, Catherine Connolly and Heather Humphreys, who are battling it out to become the 10th president of our country, got here on merit after due process.

It was such an easy decision to vote for Michael D Higgins. I even high-tailed it all the way from Galway after a day of work to cast a vote for him, making it by the skin of my teeth. I had met him a few times before he was president. He was perfect and he served in the role excellently in my view. Even when he pushed the boat out on voicing his opinion at times, he always had a very considered response. He brought a lovely flair to the stately role but it is time now for someone else to have their turn.

It is historic to only really have women in the race, and a two-horse race at that.

The tit-for-tat nature of the attacks on each is a bit exhausting. I don’t really know what each candidate wants to bring to their term in office as well as I know every single mistake each has ever made and the outrage of the other when each faux pas is aired in the media.

Each has done and said things in the houses of the Oireachtas and during the campaign that make me feel they’d be good at the job. Each has equally done and said things that make me unsure of the very same thing.

There is a game to be played and knowing that a lot of politics includes tactics and spin and an element of who can come across well on the coolest podcast, makes deciding a challenge, but I’ll figure it out in the end.