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WHEN FORMER FIANNA Fáil minister Anne Rabbitte told Albert Dolan he should consider running in the 2019 local elections, she had no way of knowing that he would usurp her in the Dáil six years later.
At 26 years of age, Dolan, now the sole Fianna Fáil TD for Galway East, is one of the youngest TDs in the 34th Dáil.
In November’s general election, he topped the poll in the constituency while Rabbitte, his running mate, lost her seat.
“You never know in politics what way things are going to go,” Dolan told The Journal from behind his desk in Leinster House.
In an interview with this publication, he revealed how Rabbitte encouraged him to put his name forward for election in 2019.
At the time, Dolan was just finishing his first year of an accountancy degree at the University of Galway when he started attending Galway East Fianna Fáil meetings.
It was in those meetings that people saw talent in him, and Rabbitte suggested he should run for the party.
“She thought I’d make a fantastic candidate for the Monivea area, but I thought there’s no way I could possibly run.
“I’m too young. I might not have the experience.
“But when it got closer to the time, the seed was planted, and I decided ‘This is what I want to do. I’m going to see if I can do it… I really would love to represent my community’,” Dolan said.
“I’m always grateful for that encouragement that Anne gave me at that time.”
Dolan had his first foray into politics at the age of 12, when he was enlisted to leaflet for his father Michael F Dolan, a Fianna Fáil candidate in the 2011 general election. campaign.
The senior Dolan wasn’t successful in that election, but 13 years later, his son would top the poll in the same constituency.
When he was in school, Dolan had a love of public speaking and was involved in things like the school play and student council.
It was when he went to college and joined Ógra Fianna Fáil, largely to make friends, that he began to take a real interest in politics.
Was it always going to be Fianna Fáil for him? It seems so.
Named after former Fianna Fáil leader and Taoiseach Albert Reynolds, both sides of Dolan’s family were Fianna Fáil supporters.
“For me, it was always Fianna Fáil, because I guess they represented the most amount of people in society.
“They represented the centre ground. They represented somebody who, I guess, wanted to make something of themselves, but also they didn’t want to leave anybody behind in society,” he said.
Since his university days and first attending Fianna Fáil meetings, Dolan’s political career has progressed fast.
He completed his accountancy degree while serving as a Galway councillor and in the 2024 local election was re-elected, topping the poll.
At the time, he was also working as an accountant in his family’s practice in Loughrea.
For many university students, running in a local election would be the last thing on their radar. For Dolan though, once he made his mind up, he had no doubts.
“I’m lucky in that I wouldn’t be very self-conscious in that regard.
“I’m not afraid to put myself out there. I’m not afraid to make mistakes. I’m not afraid to take a chance,” he said.
Dolan recalls how his first opportunity to cast a vote was in the 2018 referendum on whether to repeal the 8th amendment and legalise abortion in the State.
At the time, it was a contentious issue for Fianna Fáil, with a huge split in the parliamentary party. Party leader Micheál Martin personally campaigned for repeal but allowed a free vote on abortion issues for his party in the Dáil.
Which side of the issue did Dolan fall on?
“I would have been more pro-choice,” he said.
In Dolan’s view, Martin showed leadership on the issue, even though it wasn’t the popular choice within the party.
“He didn’t force anybody to take his side or to take his view. He led out on it, and he led from the front,” Dolan said.
The last year has been a busy one for Dolan, with two elections and a first-time appointment as Cathaoirleach of Galway County Council sandwiched in between.
“It was an incredibly tough year overall…I’ve never been as exhausted in my life as I was during that general election campaign,” he recalled.
With six months under his belt in Leinster House now, Dolan said the switch from councillor to TD has been a significant adjustment.
“It’s hard to have any expectations before you come in here. I guess I wanted to come in with an open mind. It’s a huge change from the council in terms of the volume of work.
“And the amount of people you’re dealing with on a weekly basis is just a huge multiple of what you were used to on the council,” he said.
“I’m really enjoying the role. I love having the opportunity to represent my people.”
For Dolan, housing is the big issue among his peers.
“It’s huge. Not only can young people not buy a home at the moment, but they don’t really even have the opportunity to move out of home and gain that independence in their mid-20s.”
He made the point that so many young people are also missing out on the “college experience” because of the housing crisis.
“I see it now in the towns I represent, like Athenry, Tuam, Loughrea, so many young people living at home when they’re 18, 19, 20, when historically, those younger people would have went to college, would have gained that independence, gained that life experience, when it wasn’t as cost prohibitive as it is today.”
For Dolan, having the opportunity to move out of home for his first year of college gave him opportunities to make friends, join Ógra Fianna Fáil and enjoy himself.
“If you’re living at home and you’re focused on commuting home in an evening, you’re going to miss out on that side of college.”
How does he propose to fix the housing crisis?
“My personal opinion is that the Minister for Housing needs to be given emergency powers,” he said.
“It’s not that we haven’t made progress, but what got us from 20,000 homes a year to 30,000 homes a year will not get us from 30,000 homes a year to 50,000 homes a year. The minister needs to be empowered and emboldened to go and take radical action to make sure that the homes get built.”
Specifically, Dolan wants the minister to be better empowered when it comes to zoning and being able to intervene with local authorities.
“I see so many issues with the local authorities in how decisions are being made at the moment.
“At a local authority level, it’s not being treated like a housing emergency.
In his view, more investment has to be made in delivering affordable housing that is available for private sale.
On plans to scrap rent pressure zones, Dolan said: “We’re in a bit of a catch 22: we have to make radical decisions that are going to lead to supply increasing, because without supply, we will sit here again in five years and say we’re still in the housing crisis.”
Speaking about his own experience of buying a home, Dolan said it “was a tough time”.
Asked what age he was when he bought it, he responded: “I’d have to check, but I can come back to you on that.”
The following day, he said he was 23 at the time.
“I had been outbid on two properties in another location, and where I ended up buying, I was fortunate that it was the right place at the right time, but yeah, since then it has definitely gotten harder again.
“And I see that with my own friends, they’re finding it harder and harder to get on the property ladder.”
Broadcaster Ivan Yates has described Dolan as an “Obama-type figure” and tipped him as a potential future leader of Fianna Fáil.
“No pressure,” said Dolan when this was put to him.
“I’m not concerned if Ivan thinks I’m an Obama type or not.
“I think my job is to prove to the people that voted for me that I’m the right person for the job and that I’m going to do a good job.”
But does he have any ambitions to be leader of Fianna Fáil one day?
He took a long pause to think about his answer before responding:
“I think for me, the most important thing is making sure that if I ever have the chance to represent the party at a higher level, that I do the very best job I can and always make the party proud of me, and make the people who gave me that opportunity proud of me.”
Would he like to be Taoiseach one day? Another long pause.
“It’s not for me to decide,” he says.
“Politics is a very unpredictable road, and I think my job is just to do the best job I can at the moment with where I’m at and learn from there,” he added.
Dolan may have had his fair share of elections last year, but the wider party and country are gearing up for the presidential election later this year.
For Dolan, former Minister and TD Éamon Ó Cuív is the name that comes to mind when asked who he would like to see as the Fianna Fáil candidate this year.
“I’ve seen the way he worked for his constituents in Galway West over the last 30 years, and he was a dedicated public servant with a huge love for the Gaeilge. He’d be a fantastic candidate. I think he has a great understanding of how this country works and how people operate.”
What about Bertie Ahern?
“I think if the people of the party decided to select Bertie, I think that that would be their decision. I don’t want to preempt without knowing who the candidates are and who the potential candidates are.”
Dolan also said he is in favour of lowering the voting age in Ireland from 18 to 16.
“I think you would see that the people who were still in secondary school would engage heavily with the political system, because it would become a topic at lunch breaks. It would become a topic in classrooms. It would become a huge part of their school life to be able to vote at the ages of 16 and 17.”
On a career in politics, Dolan said it is the sort of thing that one won’t know is for them until they are doing it.
“There’s a huge amount of sacrifices involved…there’s a huge leap of faith to be taken to go into politics.
“I’m fortunate in that I don’t have any children at the moment. I don’t have as many responsibilities as other people. So I really can commit to it all the way.
“But that shouldn’t prohibit somebody else from getting involved, because at the end of the day, we’re in a representative democracy, and it needs to be representative of everyone.”
He agreed that one “absolutely” has to have a thick skin to get into politics, particularly to be able to deal with reaction on social media.
“I see so many TDs now where their comments are turned off, and I think this is a bad trend,” he said.
“It leads to less engagement with the public and more division between the politicians and the people.
“We’re all the one. We’re all trying to do our best, and I think that that engagement, good, bad or indifferent, is really important.”
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