‘I will be an inclusive president for all of you,’ Catherine Connolly declared as she was announced the winner of Ireland’s presidential election – a landslide victory over Fine Gael’s Heather Humphreys.

The independent TD received 63 per cent of the vote (with spoiled ballots excluded) to become Ireland’s tenth president. The result was officially confirmed early yesterday evening, but Connolly’s victory was clear from the moment counting began. ‘Catherine will be my president,’ Humphreys conceded, having received just over 29 per cent of the vote.

Connolly defeated Humphreys in Ireland’s first head-to-head presidential race since 1973. Jim Gavin had entered the race but withdrew after revelations of a decades-old rent dispute with a former tenant – later revealed to be the now-deputy e

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