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THE DUBLIN COUNCILLOR who was censured by Fine Gael in the wake of adverse findings against her by the Mahon Tribunal is appealing the decision and has defended her record.
Therese Ridge, a member of South Dublin County Council for Clondalkin, says she was “shocked” by the decision of the Fine Gael disciplinary committee last week to remove the party whip and threaten her with expulsion from the party in the wake of findings by the Tribunal.
The party said last week that Ridge’s acceptance of a donation of IR£1,000 in relation to the Quarryvale rezoning in Dublin in 1992 was “injudicious and unwise”.
The Mahon Tribunal found that Ridge actively encouraged fellow councillors to support the rezoning of Quarryvale and was “handsomely rewarded” for her efforts. Such behaviour was deemed inappropriate and compromised her position, the Tribunal said.
The party said she must resign from all committees on which she sits within a week otherwise she faces expulsion in July.
Ridge is appealing the censure, saying in a lengthy statement released earlier this week: “I am hurt, shocked and angry at the manner in which I have been treated by own party.”
In the statement she suggests that no action would be taken against people in the Fine Gael party who were in receipt of donations from other people which were of larger amounts than she received.
“How many of them will be disciplined for damaging the party (sic). I would think none,” the statement says.
Ridge adds: “I am devastated to note that the party leader, Enda Kenny, has unquestionably accepted and endorsed the findings of the Committee. It is of course easy to give that level of support when one is unaffected by the findings.”
Speaking to RTÉ Radio’s Today with Pat Kenny programme this morning, Ridge said she was “shocked” by the discrepancies in the findings between herself and her “very good friend and colleague Deputy Olivia Mitchell” whom the committee exonerated from any wrongdoing.
She said that she was only interested in the development at Quarryvale because of the needs of her constituents, citing a 64 per cent unemployment rate at the time: “We were pressed and begged to do something,” she claimed.
“They’re looking at the rules and regulations that pertain to now and didn’t at the time,” Ridge explained.
“There was no requirement up until 1997 to state that you had received donations for elections and like hindsight is a great thing isn’t it but to actually blame someone for not stating something that was never required…
“In my almost 30 years I have never asked for a donation from anybody,” she added.
Ridge explained that a donation of IR£1,000 was brought to her home by the lobbyist Frank Dunlop in 1992 prior to the general election campaign and said that she was “delighted to get it”.
“I certainly knew Frank Dunlop for more than 30 years, we were very good friends and I was definitely supporting Quarryvale and not for Frank Dunlop, I have already outlined the reasons why,” she said.
She said she did not care what people thought about that saying that her duty was to her constituents. Ridge said that reports that Olivia Mitchell was considering resigning her seat in Dublin South if the party found adversely against her left her with a “chilly feeling” that action would be taken against her.
She added: “As far as I am concerned Therese Ridge is not a crook, nobody will ever come forward and say I asked them for money.”
“My election donation for Quarryvale was from Frank Dunlop who at the time was a pillar of society and a good friend of mine and I used it totally for the three weeks of a very cold and hard campaign without any hope of getting elected.”
Ridge received 799 first preference votes in Dublin West, finishing second last in the 1992 general election in which her Fine Gael colleague Austin Currie was elected along with Labour’s Joan Burton as well as Fianna Fáil’s Brian Lenihan and Liam Lawlor.
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300 million spent on a tribunal … It finds that FFg and FF TDs were corrupt. Enda Kenny refuses to acknowledge the corruption from one of his own TDs to save FFg Party face (Like the Catholic Church and its efforts to hide the sickening behaviours of its members).
Why the hell did we spend all that money (300 million), to get no action from FFg? They said coming into power that they would be transparent… Yeah, we see right through you pack of lieing self-serving traitors. Why have Labour not stood up and told FFg they must expel all people found to have taken money from developers? Where are Labour?
Answer: So far up FFg’s ass that they cant even remember how they got there. You guys are all on a hiding to nothing.
“”Richard Nixon is not a crook, wubba, wubba, wubba”.
1st mistake, don’t ever refer to oneself in the 3rd person.
I was just thinking the EXACT same thing. Bob Dole syndrome. Its a sign of extreme narcicissim.
This is what happens when you have a headless chicken running a party and a country. Kenny has zero credibility left. He chickened out of the debate with Adams, and is leading the country around in circles on whether or not he supports severe austerity with no growth initiative, or just severe austerity. Look at all the U-turns in the last week alone. Prior to Hollande being elected, there was Zero mention of growth initiatives. Now, since Hollande used Growth as a platform, Kenny is telling his ministers and TDs to start using the buzz word. Kenny promised zero tolerance to corruption (reminded me of the Bertie Ahearnes zero tolerance speech made when he got elected). Now we have Kenny refusing to accept the findings of the 300 million euro corruption tribunal. This guy does not stand for anything, and couldnt lead a horse to water. He has no idea what he is doing. We are all seeing that now, but its too late for the last election, but not the next one.
If a councillor resigns he/she will be replaced by someone chosen by other councillors and the replacement is usually someone from the same party.
if a TD resigns a by-election is needed and who knows how the vote will go, even in leafy Dublin South.
Could this explain why the two women were treated differently?
Barry McSweeney, yer a wise and insightful man!
These people have no moral compass.
I love her view of wrong vs right lol
Sure wasn’t everyone doing it!
Yeah we trust a crook to tell us another crook is innocent? Haha. GTFO.
have your say