Murphy’s Law strikes three times for beleaguered Leo

World of Politics with Harry McGee – harrymcgee@gmail.com

It might have been Murphy’s Law or Murphy’s Stroke – but whatever, the Murphys added up to triple trouble for Fine Gael in the past week.  There was Verona singlehandedly destroying Fine Gael chances in the bye-elections with her ill-considered views on immigrants; double- jobbing Dara on his full Dáil salary and at least one foot firmly in Europe – and Minister for the House of Cards, Eoghan Murphy, who almost brought the government down this week with Tuesday’s vote of confidence.

Fine Gael;s bad week was brought sharply into focus when the four new TD’s Mark Ward, Joe O’Brien, Pádraig O’Sullivan and Malcolm Byrne were paraded into the House by their parties.

And while Government parties rarely win bye-elections, Verona Murphy’s capacity for self-destruction makes you wonder what kind of vetting Fine Gael did before choosing her.

She was a high-achiever with an interesting backstory and a prominent position as a spokeswoman for the haulage industry during Brexit.

But some of her views were bizarre. Her stuff about many migrants being Isis supporters, or of kids of two or three being indoctrinated, or of a need to ‘reprogramme’ them. These are the things you normally only hear at a Donald Trump rally.

And what about Dara? He announced his job in Europe two years ago and then announced in mid-2018 that he was not going to stand in the next election. Leo Varadkar wished him well and said he would be missed from the Dáil.

The problem was he wasn’t going anywhere. To quote the great Con Houlihan: “Forgotten but not gone”.

Murphy has held down what has been a full-time job with the European People’s Party (EPP) for most of the past two years. It has nothing to do with the Irish parliament or indeed the EU parliament.

In the meantime, the record shows that Murphy’s Dáil input has been reduced to near zero since the end of 2017, after he took up the role with the EPP.

However, he has still claimed his full salary of €94,500, as well as his full allowance of €51,600 per annum.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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