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LABOUR IS RUNNING its party chairperson Loraine Mulligan in the Dublin West by-election later this month.
Mulligan was the only candidate to put her name forward for the selection convention which took place in Castleknock this evening, despite speculation that one of a number of local councillors would run in the 23 May vote.
Sitting Dublin West TD and Minister Joan Burton said that Mulligan is a “tireless advocate for workers, families and young people”.
“She has been working closely with me for several years, on issues ranging from investment in new school, childcare and healthcare facilities to workers’ rights and the provision of employment, training and education opportunities for young people,” Burton said in a statement issued this evening.
Local sources expressed unease about the party running an outsider – Mulligan is originally from Longford – in the constituency where it is not expected to retake the Dáil seat that it won in the 2011 by-election caused by the death of Brian Lenihan.
Labour’s former TD Patrick Nulty lost the whip just weeks after he was voted in over opposition to the budget and later quit the party altogether. He resigned from the Dáil entirely in March after sending a number of inappropriate texts and Facebook messages.
One well-placed source within the local constituency organisation, who declined to be named, said: “We’re not going to win the seat, but we would want a person who would have a decent chance of getting a respectable vote.”
Local councillors Michael O’Donovan, Mary McCamley and John Walsh, a Trinity lecturer, had been among those mentioned as possible candidates for Labour.
Mulligan was elected as chairperson of the party in November 2013 following a tight vote where she beat former general secretary Ray Kavanagh by just 22 votes thanks to the backing of the party leadership.
She has worked as a researcher in the trade union SIPTU for a number of years and also serves on the board of the European Anti-Poverty Network.
Other candidates running in Dublin West include Ruth Coppinger for the Socialist Party, David McGuinness for Fianna Fáil, Paul Donnelly for Sinn Féin, and Roderic O’Gorman for the Greens, and the independent David Hall.
Fine Gael has yet to select its candidate but is widely expected to run senator and former Olympian Eamonn Coughlan.
Separately the party has selected Gabrielle McFadden, sister of the late TD Nicky McFadden, to be its candidate in the Longford-Westmeath by-election which is also being held on 23 May.
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As someone who’s lived in Dublin West my whole life, I need to ask…who is she?
Maybe she was doing something more important/relevant than getting her pic in the local papers?
Andrew do you not think it’s important for a perspective politician to be actually recognised by the people whose vote they want?
No, not at all. We’re electing national legislators, not local fixers. Read their CVs, manifestos, listen to debates.
Ah manifesto ‘ s seriously guy, are you perhaps the only person that trusts what’s wrote in a manifesto. FG’s has disappeared from their website and Labour wrote theirs in disappearing ink.
Looks like a confirmation picture to me.
Andrew, we are electing national legislators. But I’d rather elect someone who is proven to have made a difference at local level than just immediately shove them in at national level.
I voted labour and fg last time around and I have never been so disappointed in my life.
Never again will I even consider them.
+1
“We’re not going to win the seat, but we would want a person who would have a decent chance of getting a respectable vote.”
Congratulations to the Labour genius whose aspiration knows only limits
May 23rd. Revolution day! I
No FG, LAB or FF.
…Voting SF is not revolutionary. It’s dumb.
Look forward to not voting for her.
Payback time
Kid “Daddy, daddy, whats a Labour chair”
Dad “Well son, its like a regular chair, only you pay for it with your union fees and vote,a and then when you need to use it, it withdraws it support and you land on your ar$e”
They might as well run a real chair . It would be useful and get more votes.
Labour are absolutely finished and really should go away and hide ,well actually they’ve been doing that in west Dublin for quite some time , the policies that this shower of nasty bunch of self serving idiots have been pursuing has been probably worst felt in west Dublin ….. I’d sarcastically say good luck to them but that would give those idiots some recognition … They should just stick to trying to impress team panti …… It’s about the only thing these Unemployable turn coats are interested in ….
Theres no bloody way im voting any FG or Labour or FF. Im done with all 3 of those muppets of parties.
Labour should rename themselves the Frankfurt party ffs
“She has been working closely with ME for several years, on issues ranging from investment in new school, childcare and healthcare facilities to workers’ rights and the provision of employment, training and education opportunities for young people,” Burton said in a statement issued this evening.
A statement by Burton designed to use the campaign of a candidate who has no chance of winning as a vehicle for shameless self promotion. Well done Joan!
Your heart has to go out to some of these rank and file labour candidates who in credit to them have done done good work and are now bring lead like lambs to the slaughter at the poling stations where they have to try and answer for what a few self centred higher up front benchers have done to the party.. All you had to do lab was stay in opposition 5 more years.. You would’ve been the biggest party in opposition and then won a huge and substantial amount of seats at the next general election and went into government as a majority party.. Have none of you read a history book noticed how the other junior coalition parties of the last ten years have went?? Lab, you are a disgrace to your manifesto.. Shame on you, shame on you all.. The Labour Party will never recover from this..
Even when Burton smiles she looks like she’s giving you the electric chair.
Good luck. You need it!!!
Wonderful candidate. Labour best decision in a long time. Hopes she does well.
Well said Ciara. I heard from somewhere that Fine Gael were considering running Eamon Coughlan in Dublin west .
Eamon Coughlan/running, I like what you did there.
Now that’s a well photoshopped image !
Loraine Mulligan is everything that Joan Burton isn’t….
….a Labour politician with principles.
Its Ruth Coppinger’s to lose
The only chair the lab will see is the electrics chair , RIP
We as a nation need to forget about politicians. They and the parties they represent are nothing but smokescreens. Razzmatazz, dazzle, smoke, mirrors and a poorly executed three card trick to keep our peasant attentions firmly focussed OFF the ball. They are paid and pensioned for that very reason. Our gripes lie with international banking concerns, vulture funds, external corporations who will snaffle our resources for peanuts while we squabble triballistically over who fixed the pothole. As for GAA and soccer… Divide and rule. Panis et Circensis.
The gravy train is up early and red-thumbing me. Slobber little piggies, suckle and guzzle.
Typical cronies being put in in area she knows nothing about has ever been west dublin you insult intelligence of dublin people burton you government need get out before you put out
I wonder what is more tacky and inappropriate, the misogynist comments on this thread or the majority green thumbs such comments attract?
and that’s about all
Labours way
Hope they get wiped out.
Vote for yer man..uludag..hes for everything the the other gang is against
have your say