Brendan Howlin has said he wants to at least double the number of Labour TDs after the next election.

The Labour leader was concluding the party’s “think-in” ahead of the return of the Dáil next week, when he made the comments.

Deputy Howlin said the party had to rebuild and to reconnect with people who “fell out with them”.

“I want to double to membership of the party. We have 4,000 members at present, and 50 councillors. We can have a target in the next local election of 100 council seats,” he said.

“I certainly think we can double our number of TDs, and in fact do a lot better than that.”