MINISTER FIGHTS BACK... BUT IT’S HARD TO MAKE THE VOTERS FORGET

IF EOGHAN Murphy is feeling shaken after a catastrophic start to his election campaign, he certainly didn’t show it yesterday.

Ever the smooth operator, Mr Murphy had an air of confidence as he defended his record as Housing Minister. He came armed with party colleagues Paschal Donohoe, Damien English and Deirdre Duffy, candidate for Dublin Central.

But it was Mr Murphy who took the centre stage as he argued his legacy Wasn’t. That. Bad.

‘We know we can do more’ may as well be Fine Gael’s slogan this election given how frequently the line is rolled out by Mr Varadkar and his colleagues.

And the Housing Minister used it to full effect yesterday, optimistically insisting the next five years really would be different.

Some 60,000 more homes! he said, ignoring the series of disastrous scandals that have blighted his campaign this week.

Some 10,000 already this year! he exclaimed, adding he truly believed he had made some ‘important reforms’ during his time in office. But is the prospect of all those new homes really going to comfort the elderly woman who was forced to eat her dinner off a windowsill on a Dublin street this week?

Will it provide relief to the young man who was left with life-threatening injuries after a digger accidentally scooped him up along with his home?

And what are those ‘important reforms’ worth to the loved ones of the woman in her 20s who died in a hostel?

While many might forgive Mr Murphy for possibly wanting to step away from the gargantuan task of solving Ireland’s housing crisis, the minister gave no hint of throwing in the towel.

‘Yes,’ he barked when asked if he would like to continue on in the role, not bothering to explain himself until pressed further. ‘I would like the opportunity to continue what I’ve been doing so far,’ he reasoned.

Confidently flicking back his hair, Mr Murphy made it clear he was not one to be defeated.

He lashed out at his competitors for failing to go into detail about their methods for tackling homelessness and said their manifestos had no substance.

The Dublin South East TD looked every inch the polished politician throughout the event. Sandwiched between Donohoe and Duffy, he rarely looked to them for support, instead fielding questions himself, confidently, calmly and with few pauses for thought.

Even when grilled over the news that a homeless man had been maimed by a digger that picked up his tent, Mr Murphy didn’t flinch.

Instead, he launched into a speech concerning ‘health and safety’ and ‘full investigation’.

‘I was shocked’ Mr Murphy said, later adding that he was ‘generally upset’ – still not breaking from his confident and resolute demeanour. ‘Let me be clear on this,’ he said. ‘This wasn’t a clean-up operation, a terrible thing happened and it is being investigated.’

Mr Murphy’s campaign has suffered a series of devastating blows this week

And having narrowly avoided a no-confidence motion last month, he was hardly in a strong position in the first place.

On the day the council truck crushed the homeless man in his tent, an image circulated on social media. It showed the minister’s campaign poster stuck up just metres from the horrifying scene.

And there is no doubt that the sight of Mr Murphy’s huge grin looming over that site will be etched on voters’ brains.

They will recall it every time he appears on their TV screens, every time they hear him on the radio, and it will certainly haunt him in this election.

Within hours of the news breaking, a man pulled up to the site in a white Toyota.

He brought out a pair of pliers and set about quickly taking down the poster. ‘It’s out of respect,’ the man told an Irish Daily Mail reporter.

And just like that, the poster was gone, a narrative was agreed and an investigation was launched.

It’s very easy to take down a poster; it’s not as easy to make people forget.