Fine Gael asks GAA president to join the party
Candidates approached, committees established and strategies drafted over fears of a snap vote, writes Philip Ryan
FINE Gael has approached GAA president Aogan O Fearghail about running for the party in the next general election. Senior party officials want Mr O Fearghail to run for Fine Gael in his native County Cavan when the next election is called.
However, Mr O Fearghail is understood to be reluctant to make a decision on running for the party until his tenure at the GAA ends next year.
Fine Gael are hoping to repeat the success the party has had with former GAA president Sean Kelly who has been two successful in two European election.
Fine Gael is reluctant to run Mr O Fearghail in Europe and would prefer if he contest the next general election in the Cavan/Monaghan constituency.
This comes as bad news for Fine Gael Senator Joe O’Reilly who narrowly missed out on retaining his seat in the last general election.
Mr O’Reilly has made it clear he intends to contest the next election and should Mr O Fearghail run, he would first have to take on the senator at a local selection convention. The winner of the contest will be Arts Minister Heather Humphreys’ running mate.
THEY keep telling us there’s no election coming. Sure, isn’t the confidence and supply agreement going great? Fine Gael and Fianna Fail have never worked so well together. It’s going so well Micheal Martin might decide to renew the deal and allow Leo Varadkar to govern for another two years. Not bloody likely. And if he did, he wouldn’t last much longer as Fianna Fail leader.
The fact is all political parties are in campaign mode. They have been for a while now. Trust between Fianna Fail and Fine Gael plummets with every pedantic row over policy or ham-fisted political controversy. They can barely stand each other at this stage. Meanwhile, the other parties and Independents are looking on in nervous anticipation of being forced from their cosy Leinster House offices and back on to the doorsteps.
Most TDs will tell you they have been preparing for the next election since they saw the numerical Dail mess they were presented with by the electorate last year. Pavements are being regularly pounded and doors anxiously knocked on by TDs eager to hold on to their jobs. They should be doing this whether an election is looming or not.
But backroom election preparations have intensified across all political parties. Committees have been set up, constituency strategies drafted and potential candidates approached. Ambitious local councillors are setting out their stalls ahead of selection conventions and making TDs, who spend three days a week in Dublin, nervous about their support base in the constituency.
The Sunday Independent recently revealed how Leo Varadkar put his party on election footing and established monthly war council meetings of his ministers and senior officials. The secret meetings are aimed at making sure Government decisions and policies are painted blue and will appeal to Fine Gael voters.
But things have moved on since and Fine Gael chairman Gerry O’Connell and secretary general Tom Curran have been touring the country putting constituency organisers on alert. The boundary changes present new challenges for parties and lining up the most geographically suited candidates is the name of the game.
There have also been high-level discussions about new candidates.
One of the more interesting names doing the round is GAA president Aogan O Fearghail who Fine Gael would like to run in Cavan/Monaghan. It is understood O Fearghail is eager to concentrate on his job for now but his tenure comes to an end next year.
This is bad news for local Fine Gael senator and two -term TD Joe O’Reilly, who narrowly missed out on a seat last year. O’Reilly has a strong voter base in Cavan but Fine Gael is hoping to replicate the success they had at the poll with former GAA president Sean Kelly.
Another battle royal in the making will be the fight to reclaim a seat for Fine Gael in Tipperary. Kate O’Connell is hoping to expand her newly formed political dynasty by helping her sister Mary Newman secure a seat.
She will first have to take on Fine Gael stalwart and four-term TD Tom Hayes, who is determined to reclaim his seat after falling short at the last election. A lot of resources are being pumped into Tipperary and Fine Gael is holding its annual parliamentary party away day there next month, which will be followed by a declaration of candidates. Senior Fine Gael sources insist the post-leadership contest “fatwa” against O’Connell and her family (remember the choirboy comments?) has been dropped, but you wonder how eager FG headquarters would be to get Newman on the ticket if she is defeated by Hayes.
Major efforts are also being made to win back seats in Cork, where Fine Gael was decimated in the last election — but it will be an uphill battle for many of those who lost seats. Fine Gael will want to lure former TDs back on to the ticket — but some, such as Tom Barry in Cork East, who were treated very badly by headquarters, will be reluctant.
Fianna Fail has also upped the ante as far as election preparations go. The party’s election manifesto is all but completed and former junior minister Chris Flood has been appointed to chair Fianna Fail’s constituency committee. Michael Moynihan had to step aside due to his duties as Fianna Fail chief whip.
Flood is understood to have set himself the ambitious target of completing every selection convention before New Year’s Eve is rang in on College Green in Dublin City Centre.
“No one has any information when the election will be but we just want to have it all done,” a senior Fianna Fail source said. Early selection conventions which result in new candidates panic territorial TDs who have to attend Dail debates in Dublin.
Once such potential candidate is Cathal Crowe in County Clare. At the beginning of the month, Crowe, a Fianna Fail councillor, uploaded a video of his election campaign launch to Facebook. Standing on the back of trailer with cows grazing in the background, he pledged to canvass every “high way, byway and boreen of Clare” to secure a seat for the party. The ambitious young councillor hopes to bring in a second seat and the recent boundary changes play to his advantage.
He’ll have his work cut out moving in on Timmy Dooley’s patch, but Crowe’s time working with Fianna Fail stalwart Willie O’Dea will ensure he is well prepared for any of his potential running mates’ manoeuvrings.
Dublin is the main battleground for Fianna Fail and the party hopes to continue its recovery in the capital after clawing back seats after at the last election. Fianna Fail wants to retain all its Dublin seats and, at least, add Catherine Ardagh in Dublin South Central and Mary Fitzpatrick in Dublin Central.
Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown will be another gunfight at the OK Cabinteely with veteran FF-er Mary Hanafin again set to face-off against ambitious young sharpshooters Cormac Devlin and Kate Feeney.
Devlin and Hanafin ran as candidates last time, but party strategists believe it cost them a seat. Like McGregor versus Mayweather, the smart money on a Fianna Fail seat is on the experienced political streetfighter, but Devlin won the selection convention last time out and Hanafin had to be added to the ticket.
The focus of Brendan Howlin and the Labour Party is also Dublin. After a near wipeout in 2016, the party hopes to lure voters back from hard-left parties like the Anti-Austerity Alliance and the Social Democrats as the economy continues to improve and interest in populist politics wanes.
Sinn Fein has fought five elections (two Northern Ireland Assembly, two Westminster and one general election) and one referendum since 2015. Who knows where they get the resources from to campaign for elections perpetually but somehow they manage.
No doubt Gerry Adams and Co are determined to improve on their last outing and have put it up to the other main political parties by saying they willing to enter coalition, even as a minority party. This might be a hard sell to their base and it will be even more difficult to expand their appeal with Adams at the helm. But then the UK and the Corbynite revolution shows theirs is a constituency for cult politics.
‘Nobody knows when the election will be but we want it all done’