There’s one rule for Fine Gael, and a much tougher one for everybody else

The Taoiseach’s staunch defence of Verona Murphy provides yet more evidence of the party’s smug hypocrisy about political standards, writes Eilis O’Hanlon

‘Why are other parties not given the same benefit of the doubt as Fine Gael?’

OTHER parties rightly criticised Sinn Fein for initially refusing to reveal the margin by which Michelle O’Neill overcame a rare challenge to retain the vice-presidency of her party at last weekend’s ard fheis in Derry, but at least there was a contest, even if it was held behind closed doors.

Last week, Leo Varadkar was in the Croatian capital for the European People’s Party (EPP) congress, the annual gathering of centre-right politicians, at which Donald Tusk was elected as the new president of the group unopposed with a 93pc approval rating — still a little way behind North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, who wins his own leadership battles with 100pc support on a 100pc turn-out, but still hardly democratic. “Well done, Donald,” the Taoiseach tweeted flatteringly afterwards.

Soon he was also issuing congratulations to Minister for European Affairs Helen McEntee who was elected vice-president of the group at the same meeting. One of 10 vice-presidents of the EPP, to be precise, though that fact wasn’t mentioned at all in the subsequent Fine Gael press release, which made it sound instead as if McEntee had swept to victory single-handedly in Zagreb on a wave of support. How many votes did McEntee receive on the day? The FG press release didn’t offer that helpful detail either. Why not just publish the figures openly instead of unveiling winning candidates as if at a coronation? It’s hard to criticise Sinn Fein for a culture of spin and secrecy when doing the same.

The charge of hypocrisy against Fine Gael is all the stronger in light of the Taoiseach’s continuing strong show of support for Verona Murphy, the party’s candidate in this Friday’s Wexford by-election. She has been under fire after stating Islamic State militants form a “big part of the migrant population”, and that asylum seekers may need to be “deprogrammed” before coming to live in Ireland to “alleviate that type of indoctrination”.

With tensions running high in parts of the country over the controversial resettling of asylum seekers in small rural communities, her remarks were bound to be explosive. Migrants’ groups have dubbed them “Islamophobic” and called for her to be dropped from the Fine Gael ticket. On Friday, RTE even asked gleefully: “Has Irish politics become racist?” Many activists on the left sincerely seem to hope it has, so they can offer themselves as the compassionate, progressive alternative.

The Taoiseach says he has spoken to Murphy about the remarks, which he described somewhat bathetically in the Dail last week as “not on”, and is satisfied with the two apologies which she has since issued on the matter. “That,” he asserts, “is good enough for me.”

The candidate herself has also visited Syrian families at a direct provision centre in neighbouring Co Waterford to express her remorse, which she then eagerly imparted to the media, along with the migrants’ apparent acceptance of said apology, because nothing says “sorry” more than a hastily arranged PR exercise.

Verona Murphy’s fate is for the people of Wexford to decide on Friday. Whatever decision they reach hardly absolves the Taoiseach himself from the charge of hypocrisy, though. When asked about social media posts made nine years ago by Fianna Fail Senator Lorraine Clifford-Lee, a candidate in the Dublin Fingal by-election, to be held on the same day, the Taoiseach declared that he was disappointed with the rival party’s response to her off-colour comments on social media, insisting that “just describing them as inappropriate isn’t enough”. Pot, say hello to kettle.

Indeed, he was reported to have condemned Clifford-Lee’s tweets as “misogynistic, racist, classist and body-shaming”. There was much more forgiveness for Verona Murphy, whose comments were arguably far more offensive.

The Tanaiste has also backed Verona Murphy, saying: “I think she’s learnt some very valuable and important lessons.” According to Simon Coveney, the Fine Gael candidate “didn’t quite understand the importance of the issue and the importance of responsible political language in terms of migrants. She certainly understands it now, I can assure you.”

Why wasn’t Lorraine Clifford-Lee accorded the same benefit of the doubt, not least in light of the fact that her own offending comments, unlike Murphy’s, were made years before she was a by-election candidate?

The answer is right there in the question. Clifford-Lee is a Fianna Fail candidate. Murphy is a Fine Gael candidate, therefore she gets judged by a different set of rules. It really is as simple, and as tribal, as that. Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan even suggested that Verona Murphy’s views had been “based on false rumours and misinformation”, and went on to implicitly blame social media for allowing anti-migrant sentiment to “take root in our country”.

How long before Fine Gael subjects Twitter and Facebook to a Verona Murphy-style system of “deprogramming” to “alleviate that type of indoctrination” too?

The Taoiseach’s and his Cabinet colleagues’ time would be better spent removing the beams from their own eyes before attempting to point accusingly at the specks in their brothers’, especially when it hardly bears thinking about what mischief Fine Gael would have made of things had the favoured representative of another party, on top of being linked to the promotion of anti-migrant sentiment, also been named in an allegation about workplace bullying.

Despite some earlier confusion, the party now says it was aware that the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) had ruled in favour of an office manager at the Irish Road Haulage Association (IRHA) who claimed she had been penalised for raising concerns about

Verona Murphy and two others.

Murphy denied any wrongdoing and the WRC decision was later appealed to the Labour Court by the IRHA and settled — “amicably”, according to the Taoiseach. As far as Fine Gael is concerned, the matter is now “in the past” and “would not have any bearing on the future”. But what if it had been Fianna Fail, or Labour, or Sinn Fein? It’s doubtful Fine Gael would let it go so easily.

Fine Gael’s problem is that it is unable to see itself as anything other than virtuous and uprightly respectable, so its missteps are always brushed off as “foolish” or “naive”, or even the result of the malice and misinformation of others. The one exception is Maria Bailey, who has been deselected in Dun Laoghaire after trying to claim some compo for falling off a swing.

That he was so tough on Bailey is what provides the Taoiseach with the cover to go easy on Verona Murphy, because he can always point to the young Dublin woman’s downfall to prove his zero tolerance for candidates who bring the party into disrepute. The party that he leads shouldn’t be allowed, as FF leader Micheal Martin put it, to “speak out of both sides of their mouth” on such delicate issues by flirting with populist rhetoric one minute before playing the wounded innocent when caught out.

Attention now urgently needs to turn to that impromptu visit to the detention centre in Dungarvan, which was organised by the Justice Minister, who is also the party’s director of elections. What strings were pulled to get her that convenient photo opportunity, and is it really appropriate to use asylum seekers as props in such an obvious and cynical political stunt?