‘Gallagher’s words might fill a notebook but melt away like candyfloss afterwards’
SEÁN Gallagher’s eyebrows shoot skywards when asked as to whether he might feel that we owe him the presidency because of what happened last time round.
Beside him his wife, Trish, shifts amid deep irritation in her seat on the campaign bus.
Wordlessly, both make it clear that this is not a fair question.
But is there, perhaps, a sense that he might feel hard done by?
“No. I made a point on the radio the other day that the campaign to seek clarification in 2011 was all about fairness,” he says.
“But .... that’s 2011, this is 2018. All of us have moved on and 2018 is about the issues that face Ireland now.”
The presidential candidate tends very much towards Bertieism. You might fill a notebook, but his words melt away like candyfloss afterwards.
There is a lot of ‘motivational speaking’ stuff – of people reaching their ‘potential’, of ‘shaping our communities’ and the importance of people feeling ‘empowered’.
You have to search to pull out something solid and though it’s all positive, will it be enough to have the electorate feeling inspired – especially given that we’ve heard it all before?
The couple have hit the hustings in County Wicklow, where they now live in Delgany, with their two young children.
There is a morning interview with East Coast Radio in Bray, where Gallagher tells host Declan Meehan that he wants to be a president of all the people of Ireland, North and south. He says that, though he grew up ‘20 miles away’ from Arlene Foster, he never got to meet her until he started to work with a cross-Border business group.
Later, he tells us that he found Foster to be “engaging and incredibly passionate” about working for her community.
But he wouldn’t be drawn on her comment about the DUP’s ‘blood red lines’ on Brexit, saying that was ‘a matter for Government and not the president’.
His command of Irish is ‘like the vast majority of people who studied Irish in the Leaving,’ he admits – but he would like to start a language programme inviting people to ‘Learn with the President’.
Gallagher vows that his campaign will be carbon neutral and will plant trees to offset any emissions.
From the radio show, it’s on to the Purple House cancer support group on Bray’s Parnell Road. Set up by Veronica O’Leary some 28 years ago following her own diagnosis, when she found non-medical support services to be sadly lacking, the centre now helps some 1,200 people a year.
There, Gallagher meets 14-year-old Hannah O’Toole, who started coming to the centre at the age of eight, after her father was diagnosed with cancer.
She still comes, she explains, saying it is a place where she can be herself.
Hannah now helps younger children dealing with cancer in the family, Veronica says.
We retire to the bus where Gallagher says that his job over next few weeks is “to outline all our visions for the future”.
Was he annoyed to still find himself talking about his Fianna Fáil fundraising activities, seven years on?
“Who’s still talking about it? I’m not talking about it,” he says firmly. “I’m talking about 2018.”
Next it’s off to St Laurence’s School in Delgany where the Gallaghers’ son, Bobby, is in high infants.
The sixth class pupils have done their research well and they put forward a range of questions, from Brexit to what he hopes to achieve as president.
There’s a gale of laughter as he is asked what he thinks of his fellow Dragons’ Den competitors going up against him.
“In life your greatest competition is not against your competitors but with yourself,” he tells them.