Irish Election - Coverage of Irish Politics, News and Current Affairs

With a week to digest the election results, the Green Party might be credited with an emerging strategy to take into their negotiations for a renewed programme for government and, in theory at least, the second part of the process of government for however long it lasts. It was assessed here and elsewhere that the [...]

Enda and George will be looking to nail the Greens into the coffin on Tuesday. Both men know that the motion of no confidence will not succeed. Both know that if they were to move into government that in the eyes of the international community they’d be committed to supplying €4bn of taxpayers money to [...]

The Green Party will be making a final pitch for votes with a question and answer session tonight at 8:30. ‘The Green Room’ will be live on their website with questions taken live for John Gormley, Eamon Ryan and Deirdre de Burca / Dan Boyle too.

This the first in a series of posts written members of political parties. Irish Election contacted members of Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, Labour and The Green Party who are active online and asked them to provide a post of between 600 and 1000 words on the brief “Why you should vote for X Party’s candidates in the European elections”.

I will post them in the opposite order to how we posted the party political broadcasts, two today, two tomorrow. That means the Greens are up first then Labour, Fine Gael after them and lastly Fianna Fáil. Other parties are welcome to submit posts to my personal email as seen on my website (easier keep them all together). Deadline is noon tomorrow and not a minute later. Posts must be written by party members who are not standing for election.

Written by Andrew Murphy. Andrew is based in Galway, a former chair of the Young Greens and national co-ordinator for the party.

–

This week almost 400 million voters will go to the polls to take part in the biggest exercise in representative democracy after India. However, this event should not just be celebrated as an example of Europe’s peaceful transition – it should be treated as an opportunity to shape Europe, and its role on the world, in the coming years. You will not just be voting for “Ireland’s team” in Europe, you will be voting for men and women who will have a profound impact on this continent. This is not a decision to be taken lightly.

Eddie Hobbs, Darina Allen, Duncan Stewart and Sean ‘dublin bay’ Loftus greeted me on page 5 of my Irish Times today – a full page spread bought by the Green Party to encourage people to vote green.
Will those ringing endorsements be enough to get them over the line on election day? Eddie Hobbs might swing [...]

The early numbers are out from tomorrow’s breakdown of the European race. Keith had some of the early East constituency numbers online a while ago and the rest of the details is clearing up now. Yesterday had Fianna Fail on 20%, Labour on 23% and Fine Gael on 36% – interesting to see how the [...]

I guess this is part of the Brian Lenihan tour of uncomfortable media hotspots, a feature in today’s Guardian with Economics Editor Larry Elliot. The tone is remarkably conciliatory, cautious and even underwhelming.  Stark contrast to the irrepresible talk of green shoots, doom mongers and Lehman Brothers from the party when talking for domestic consumption.
There [...]

Yesterday we had plans for apartment dwellers (can you canvass them?), plans for the unemployed (well 2,000 of the almost 500,000), plans for retraining those on part-time, opposition policies for Dublin and for small business. Calls for tax cuts and incentives – woo hoo for voters! You would think it is a general election.
A cautionary [...]

He is a clean green, David Geary, candidate in Dublin Central for the Greens. He just put up a video about dog poo on youtube and is handing out pooper scoopers to voters. Have a look for some ace dubbing to boot. Aww, cute doggies…

Forget jobs. Think poo.

Is when you get one you recognise it and leave it at that. Dan Boyle this afternoon seems to have strayed past that line. Getting Brian Cowen to change his position from a willingness to ‘discuss with the Greens any concerns they have about the programme for Government’ to a commitment to sitting down and [...]

If there is one thing you should do today it’s buy The Irish Examiner. Go, g’wan, buy it. Even if you’re not from Cork. Even if you’re not from Munster. Feck it, go and buy it if you’ve never bought a paper or watched the news before. Please, for the good of the country, buy [...]

The Greens looking for the a renegotiating of the programme for government is their biggest chance ever to get their policy ideas implemented. They hold now the strongest card they will ever have over Fianna Fail and that is if they withdraw from power then FF face an election from which they may never recover. [...]

Dan Boyle spoke in Tralee today. The tone is very interesting. Here’s quotes pulled from the press release, my emphasis added…
“There are too many unresolved issues. Too many policy errors remain that have not been admitted to, areas where responsibility has not been taken. The policy of pump priming the property boom has been a [...]

Well, here comes the Bert. A stint as Mayor before a trip to the Aras? No harm to keeping his profile up. Either way, the government and John Gormley will be giving us another election next year as Dublin gets a directly elected mayor.
Some details below the fold – what do you think?

For Europe, an effort to get back into parliament. @Deirdredeburca probably won’t be happy. She also dishes the dirt in a Hot Press interview.
Former MEP Patricia McKenna has confirmed she is to quit the Green Party and run in the forthcoming European elections as an Independent candidate.
Ms McKenna said she took the decision to leave [...]

Deirde De Burca is offering €1,500 Euro in prize money to winners of her compitions. Yes €1,500. She is having 3 competitions; Best photo of another European City,  Best Slogan about Europe and Democracy and Best Green Business Idea, each with a prize of €500.
Now considering that the Senator received no declared donations last year, is she [...]