Merger With Democratic Left and Recent Electoral Performance
Labour presented the 1997 election, held just weeks after spectacular victories for the French Parti Socialiste and Tony Blair's New Labour, as the first ever choice between a government of the left and one of the right, but the party, as had often been the case following its participation in coalitions, lost support and failed to retain half of its Dáil seats. A poor performance by Labour candidate Adi Roche in the subsequent election for President of Ireland led to Spring's resignation as party leader.
In 1997 Ruairi Quinn became the new Labour leader. Negotiations started almost immediately and in 1999 the Labour Party merged with Democratic Left, keeping the name of the larger partner.
Quinn resigned as leader in 2002 following the poor results for the Labour Party in the general election, when the Labour Party was returned with only 21 seats, the same number of seats as it had held before that General Election. Former Democratic Left TD Pat Rabbitte became the new leader, the first to be elected directly by the members of the party.
In the June 2004 elections to the European Parliament, Proinsias De Rossa retained his seat for Labour in the Dublin constituency. This was Labour's only success in the election.
Read more about this topic: History Of The Irish Labour Party
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