Criticism of Verona may have helped her

FURIOUS Fine Gael insiders believe condemnation by senior party figures may have handed Verona Murphy the support of the rebel rural voters who previously backed Mick Wallace.

In the wake of the by-election in which the Wexford truckers’ representative came third despite initially being the favourite, Ms Murphy pledged to run for Fine Gael in the general election.

However, she was last week axed by the Taoiseach amid growing concerns that serious damage was being done to Fine Gael on the issue of ‘party values’ after her comments about child migrants and Isis.

After apologising during the campaign, she revisited the issue again last week, warning of a London Bridgestyle attack in Wexford and that her views were based on briefings by international security experts in her role as president of the Irish Road Haulage Association, as migrants snuck onto her members’ trucks.

On Friday, Mr Varadkar went further than he had before in condemning Ms Murphy’s comments, saying he was ‘glad’ she hadn’t been elected.

It came after Health Minister Simon Harris again strongly condemned her, saying his party’s decision to deselect Ms Murphy, pictured, was ‘looking better by the moment’.

Fine Gael insiders now believe criticism from senior party figures has given her a boost in the constituency. Commenting on the debacle one frustrated minister said: ‘It is an astonishing achievement even by our standards. We have a gay, Indian leader and we are being associated with the whole [Peter] Casey agenda.’

After Fine Gael deselected her, Ms Murphy deferred any decision on her political future until mid-January.

The high-profile candidate also launched a stinging critique of her former Fine Gael colleagues claiming she had been ‘silenced’ by the party before the election and shunned afterwards. She also said she would ‘get up, I will turn the page’.

One constituency source said: ‘Now that Wallace is gone there will be a big outlier vote. Where will that go?’ and added that ‘this is all the Casey vote.

‘It’s a rebel vote. It’s the vote of those who feel they aren’t getting a fair shake in society.’