Greens Call for Review of Fianna Fail Galway Races Tent

Niall O Brolchain took up some of the comments made in the Business Post attributed to Seamus Brennan on Sunday and called for a review of the whole Galway Races tent. Certainly it smacks of pretty uncomfortable symbolism but it would be an equally big win for the Green party if it got concessions on the corporate donations/Galway races issue.

Having said that it is not just Fianna Fail, all the major parties engage in similar fundraising and as O Brolchain points out, many accounts are merely an afterthought, reform would certainly begin to clean up the process but how far it gets is quite another matter with so many interests favouring the status quo. Full comments below the fold

I would agree with Minister Brennan’s comments in the Sunday Business Post that the tent has become a ‘lightening rod’ for controversy. It is an annual reminder that the regulation of political donations is woefully insufficient. That neither Fianna Fail, Fine Gael, Labour nor the PDs recorded any donations in their accounts for last year, yet managed to spend millions during this year’s general election campaign, is an absolute disgrace.

“I don’t think that anybody in Green Party would have a problem with Fianna Fail politicians attending the races, but the symbolism of the corporate tent definitely needs to be looked at.

“It is our hope that the commitment in the Programme for Government to establish an independent electoral commission will provide the means to more properly define what appropriate political fundraising is and how it can be undertaken.”
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