Naoise Coogan
Micheal Martin while on a whistlestop tour of Kilkenny city, last week declared that there was plenty of room in the new Fianna Fail party for outspoken politicians.
John McGuinness must have breathed a sigh of relief as the new leader of Fianna Fail hailed the Kilkenny TD’s past record of standing out from the crowd and pointing out weaknesses in the party, which previous leaders had been adverse to hearing.
“I have no illusions about John McGuinness’s independence of mind and of opinion and I believe that parliament must become stronger through this type of politician. A radical reform of the political system is being proposed by Fianna Fail and we simply have to change the way we do things. John McGuinness has led the way in this respect and we must accept these opinions. There must be room for people to give their opinions and their views.”
He added that he had worked in the past with Deputy McGuinness while he was senior minister at the Department of Enterprise and Deputy McGuinness was junior minister and he pointed out that he and Deputy McGuinness had got on very well together.
He also dismissed the local concerns that Deputy McGuinness appeared to be distancing himself from the Fianna Fail Party with the only reference to the party on his posters being a tiny pale harp in the corner. It has been claimed locally that the harp is virtually impossible to see and that Deputy McGuinness had designed the posters as so, intentionally.
“I don’t believe that at all,” said Deputy Martin. “I think everybody knows that John McGuinness and Fianna Fail are two sides of the one coin.
He also added that south Kilkenny Fianna Fail TD Bobby Aylward was considered quite an outspoken TD in Dail Eireann.
“Bobby Aylward is another man who very much speaks his mind. I don’t know what is about Carlow-Kilkenny but your deputies don’t hold back. Bobby Aylward is a very strong advocate for the agri-food industry and this is very important for job creation in rural areas. And I welcome this ‘outspoken-ness’. It will help form the new era of government that is needed in this country following a Parliament that oversaw the banking crisis. The next government will be very different to what we have had in the past.”
He admitted that Bobby Aylward however, appeared to be under pressure in south Kilkenny in his campaign to get re-elected with Fine Gael Senator John Paul Phelan and Labour’s Ann Phelan also seeking support in the area.
“Bobby is under some pressure and it will be a huge challenge to retain two seats in this constituency but I think we can do it. He really is a very able TD and he is a fierce fighter. He is a great friend to the farmer and I think that all of this will stand to him come election day,” said Deputy Martin.
During his visit to Kilkenny on Friday last week, Deputy Martin visited Enable Ireland and the Fr McGrath Centre where he spoke to the managers and employees of the two centres and witnessed the excellent work that takes place enhancing the lives of young people on a daily basis.
Speaking of the Fr McGrath Centre and the current threat to funding for the children at risk programme, Deputy Martin said that he would be very supportive of maintaining the current funding for the facility.
“Some ten years ago this project was considered a novel concept — an unusual way of dealing with a problem. This programme was a policy outside of the box and we are interested in policies like these that give wider opportunities to children and the State has to be flexible enough to cater for these programmes that do such good work in the community.”
Finally speaking of his u-turn on severance payments last week, Deputy Martin said that when he had initially stated that the status quo would remain, he said that he had only been two-and-a-half weeks in as leader of Fianna Fail and that he had not thought about the matter prior to that.
“This issue was the last thing on my mind at this time, and I don’t agree that I have flip-flopped on this issue as is being alleged by opposition parties. Now that I have thought about it I think the right thing to do is to give up my severance payment and any other politician who is re-elected as a deputy will have to do so too. Severance payments are normally made to those who lose jobs. Many ministers will be re-elected as deputies as therefore they are not losing their jobs and therefore they should not expect a severance payment. I can’t understand Eamon Gilmore’s take on this issue considering he was the recipient of a severance payment while he was a sitting TD — he has been very vocal on this issue for someone who accepted this payment himself,” he pointed out.
