You’re no victim, Leo tells Murphy

TAOISEACH Leo Varadkar told Paul Murphy that he is ‘not a victim’ during a heated Dáil exchange in which the Solidarity TD claimed gardaí orchestrated the Jobstown charges.

A fresh row over the Jobstown trial erupted in the Dáil after Mr Murphy used parliamentary privilege to accuse some members of the gardaí of committing perjury.

During the heated exchanges that followed, Mr Varadkar branded the behaviour of protesters at the November 2014 Jobstown demo as ‘thuggery’.

And he rejected Mr Murphy’s renewed calls for an ‘independent public inquiry’ into evidence given by gardaí during the nineweek case, saying the Solidarity TD was given a fair trial and was not a ‘victim of any conspiracy’.

Ceann Comhairle Seán Ó Fearghaíl has referred the remarks made by Mr Murphy to the parliamentary legal adviser.

This follows an initial examination of the transcript by Mr Ó Fearghaíl during the heated exchange yesterday between Mr Murphy and Mr Varadkar.

If it is found that Mr Murphy’s comments breached the rules surrounding Dáil privilege, they could be referred to the Committee on Procedures and Privileges.

Last month, Mr Murphy was one of the six defendants cleared by a jury at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court of falsely imprisoning former tánaiste Joan Burton and her adviser Karen O’Connell at a protest held outside an adult education centre in Jobstown, Tallaght, Dublin, on November 15, 2014.

But there were cries of ‘hear, hear’ in the Chamber yesterday when Mr Varadkar called on Mr Murphy to apologise to Ms Burton for his role in the demonstration.

Mr Varadkar also told Mr Murphy that his behaviour that day had been ‘unbecoming’ of a member of Dáil Éireann.

He said: ‘Deputy, you had a fair trial. It went on for nine weeks. Your peers heard both sides of the case, the prosecution and the defence, and they reviewed the evidence and they acquitted you of false imprisonment.

‘You are not a victim here. You are not the victim of any conspiracy. You had a fair trial and you were acquitted, but that does not mean that your behaviour was right.

‘It may well be the case that the deputy was not engaged in kidnapping, but it was thuggery and your behaviour was wrong.

‘For those of us who have seen some of the coverage of it that was broadcast on television, whether it was the anger, the virulence, the words that were being directed at two women going about their course of work on the day, a water balloon being thrown in somebody’s face, all of those things were behaviour that is unbecoming of a Member of this House, unbecoming of somebody who believes in democracy and unbecoming of somebody who has any respect for other human beings.’

Speaking outside Leinster House yesterday, Ms Burton said: ‘It is very important in terms of the work gardaí do that they got everyone out of that particular event without any injury to anybody.’

‘Deputy, you had a fair trial’