WHIPLESS FIANNA FÁIL backbench TD Mattie McGrath has announced that he is to leave the party entirely, and will contest the general election as an independent candidate in his constituency of Tipperary South.
McGrath, who was first elected to the Dáil at the last general election in 2007, had lost the Fianna Fáil whip in June of last year after opposing the Government bill to outlaw stag hunting.
At the time, he had claimed that the government was unfairly trampling on rural culture and practices, and voted against the Bill in protest – being removed from the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party as a result.
Now, however, McGrath has told RTÉ News he has written to his local cumann of the Fianna Fáil party to express his wish to leave the party, and has informed the party’s headquarters of his decision.
Though he intends to keep his seat in Dáil Éireann at the next election, he will run as an independent candidate.
The Irish Independent quotes McGrath as saying he felt he had been forced out of the party after he was “let down and double-crossed” by finance minister Brian Lenihan, who he felt had never accepted him as an elected representative “because he had other cronies that he was dealing with”.
When contacted by TheJournal.ie this afternoon, a spokesperson for McGrath said he had yet to decide on whether he would support the Finance Bill in its passage through the Dáil this week.
With McGrath – as well as fellow independents Jackie Healy-Rae and Michael Lowry – being undecided on their votes, the numbers declared in favour and opposed to the Bill stands tied at 79 votes apiece.
Read more from McGrath in the Irish Independent >
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