Presidency is not a Rose of Tralee contest for over-35s. Some qualities are non-negotiable
Irish
democracy was reduced to in recent months as the media conducted virtual auditions for the next
Uachtaráin na hÉireann
. Joe Duffy, Linda Martin, Conor McGregor, Mary Hanafin, Fintan O'Toole, Michael McDowell, Heather Humphreys, Barry Andrews, Michelle O'Neill, Seán Kelly, Frances Fitzgerald, Mick Wallace, Geraldine Byrne Nason, Colum Eastwood, Frances Black, Peter Power, Peter Casey, Cynthia Ní Mhurchú, Jarlath Burns, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, Mike Ryan, Micheál Martin, Mary Lou McDonald, Gerry Adams, Uncle Tom Cobley and all. Anyone with name recognition, a two-piece suit and an ability to string a cúpla focal together – or not – has been given a twirl. It's been mildly entertaining; a sort of Rose of Tralee for the over-35s.
Certainly, some excellent potential candidates have been mentioned in dispatches. As for others, I can only echo the woman in Dublin's O'Connell Street when Channel Four News invited her to contemplate a President
McGregor
– 'Jesus, Christ, I'd leave the country.' Remember, the bum on the seat in the Oval Office was, once upon a time, treated as a comedic diversion, but we need not look that far for proof. Our own country, after all,
selected a turkey
to represent us in the Eurovision Song Contest.
This week, two contestants have been announced. Both are serious candidates with appeal for entirely different classes of voters. Former EU commissioner
Mairead McGuinness
has the fluency and boardroom polish of a Fine Gael blue blood. Independent TD
Catherine Connolly
applies her polish to advocacy for peace and justice.
Others are limbering up on the sidelines. Declan Ganley, a socially conservative businessman, and Aubrey McCarthy, a first-time senator, are reported to be seeking Oireachtas nominations, while Aontú dangles the promise of a super candidate. Meanwhile, Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin wait and watch like snipers behind the ditch. It's time the rest of us started taking this election seriously.
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Few events exposé Ireland's innate Pontius Pilate syndrome quite as sharply as a presidential election. Maybe it's a native postcolonial sense of powerlessness that creates ripples of ridicule in the discussion. Each time a vacancy occurs, the bellyaching starts that the office is but a frivolous waste of money and should be abolished. The same impulse marks the conversation about neutrality; the idea that, in the greater scheme of things, Ireland is too insignificant for its constitutional pacifism to impinge on the global realpolitik.
Currently, there are those arguing that the Occupied Territories Bill won't make any difference to besieged Palestinians in the West Bank and, ergo, we should wash our hands of it. If what Ireland does is irrelevant, why are Israel's propagandists operating a virulent anti-Ireland campaign with the help of useful idiots in the Trump administration? When a so-called diplomat like Mike Huckabee resorts to cartoonish stereotyping about the drunken Irish, you know you've got them worried.
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Taoiseach rejects US politicians' claims that Occupied Territories Bill is 'diplomatic intoxication'
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The argument that the role of president is devoid of real power is an odd perspective to cling to after 35 consecutive years of radical presidencies. Since the start of the summer, broadcasters and headline writers have been puzzling over the mystery of why nobody appeared keen on the €330,000-a-year job. Could it be the boredom of seven years languishing in the Park that is deterring them? Or maybe it's the cut-throat election campaign?
The bigger mystery is that one glaringly obvious reason for the hesitancy goes unmentioned – fear of failure. The bar has been set so high by Mary Robinson, Mary McAleese and Michael D Higgins that, sooner or later, some incumbent will not be the most popular person in the land. That consideration narrows the field of potential contenders to the truly committed and those who truly ought to be committed.
Ireland's international relationships are changing dramatically. The country is no longer the beggar of the EU, the cap-doffing neighbour of the UK or the all-singing, all-dancing darling of the US. We need a president who can, simultaneously, represent its evolving identity abroad and those it is leaving behind at home.
Many of the names that have been floated have a certain cachet. Most have read a book or two, know to work the dinner cutlery from the outside-in and not to speak with their mouths full of food or fury. But this is not a beauty contest. It's not even a personality contest. The X factor being sought is character. Instead of asking who we want to be the next president, we might more usefully ask what we want them to be.
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The next president should be selected by lottery. It could be you
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Brave, for starters. I want a president who will not buckle under intimidation. Someone with the fortitude Higgins showed when he rejected Israel's anti-Semitism smear as
'a slander against Ireland'
.
I want a president who will show solidarity with Irish citizens in Northern Ireland when their tricolour and effigies of their political leaders are set aflame on Twelfth bonfires.
I want a president who cannot but weep at the sight of man's inhumanity, as Robinson did during the Somali famine, thus drawing the world's attention to it.
I want a president who is for all the people and not only those of her own persuasion, as McAleese demonstrated when she
drew the ire of the Catholic hierarchy
by taking communion at a Protestant service in Christ Church Cathedral.
I want a president who will stand with immigrants in the face of racist protests. Someone who will visit
GAA-playing Palestinian children
from the Occupied Territories to assure them that
the decision by the Department of Justice forbidding their Irish tour
misrepresents this country's values.
I want a president who will be unavoidably absent should the Taoiseach emulate Keir Starmer by unfurling an invitation for a State visit when he visits Trump next St Patrick's Day and the big bully turns up here.
I want a president who will get out of the Áras to stand with victims of sexual and domestic violence, young people at risk of harm, the homeless, the sick, casualties of injustice and miscarriages of justice, artists and the caretakers of Ireland's natural ecology.
The pages of history keep turning. Ireland has arrived at the chapter where it finds its voice. It needs a president who will encourage it to keep raising it, for the country's own good and for the greater good.
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Irish Times
6 hours ago
- Irish Times
Ireland will be rememberd as a beacon in dark times if we pass the Occupied Territories Bill
Ireland has taken a position of empathy and solidarity towards the suffering of Palestinian people. But the Government needs to continue to back up words with action. This is why passing the Occupied Territories Bill , which the foreign and trade committee recommends should include trade in services , is so important. Right now around the world, the same people, politicians and media outlets who obfuscated, approved – and effectively gave licence to Israel to carry out unfettered war crimes by constantly stating that it 'has a right to defend itself', as though that's what it was doing – are currently embarking upon a collective reversal. The spines achingly visible under the thin skin of starving children have finally prompted a vague expression of another kind of backbone. [ Israel increasingly isolated as more countries sign up to recognise Palestine Opens in new window ] In so many ways, it's too late. In others, whatever on earth can be done to stop the horror being perpetrated on Gaza and the West Bank, whatever action to end Israel's daily massacres and strategic starvation of Palestinians, has to happen. It had to happen yesterday, and since it didn't, it has to happen today. This heel-dragging is incredibly frustrating. But what it also demonstrates is that everyone who called out war crimes and genocide for what they are from the get-go was right. READ MORE Famine unfolding in Gaza: 'Children are eating grass and weeds at the side of the road' Listen | 23:23 A recent, very good letter to The Irish Times advocated for the Government to call a national day of protest. Tánaiste Simon Harris posted this letter to Instagram, and wrote: 'The people of Ireland stand with the people of Palestine. We stand for human rights, for international law, for a two-state solution, for aid to flow, for hostages to be released. We stand for peace. We stand for an end to genocide. The suggestion for a national day or moment of solidarity made by Michael Cush in the letter above is sensible and a good idea. It could be powerful if many countries did it together. I will now talk to colleagues on how to make this happen.' [ Occupied Territories Bill: Irish voters grow more cautious, poll shows Opens in new window ] There have been many national days of protest and solidarity over the past two years, with hundreds of thousands of people participating – marching, protesting, rallying, fundraising, cycling, hiking, running, swimming, cooking, holding concerts, markets and matches, producing T-shirts and art – and doing everything they could to raise awareness and funds, all of which makes up an undeniable network of unbreakable grassroots solidarity. This is already meaningful. While I am all for more protest – and the public does not need Government to give it a seal of approval, although it would be powerful to see all politicians in the Dáil and Seanad hold their own protest or march with those already on the streets – the public cannot draft legislation. The Government needs to do what is within its power. That means passing the Occupied Territories Bill, including trade in services. It also means ending the transport of weapons of war and their components in Irish airspace – a question which Harris flubbed during an interview on The Late Late Show – and ending the export of components of machinery such as drones from companies in Ireland to Israel. The people are doing their work on the ground and in communities. The Government needs to do its work in Leinster House. The 41st anniversary of the beginning of the Dunnes Stores strike protesting against apartheid South Africa passed recently. The people who participated in that strike – and Mary Manning was just 21 years old when she took the stand that catalysed it – did so at personal and financial cost. But the real cost of a stand such as this is never money, inconvenience, disapproval, the loss of acceptability or access to cliques of power. It's about what happens when you don't take it. And that's about our soul and integrity. It's about our morality and our ethical steadfastness. It's no surprise then, to see Manning at Palestine solidarity protests 41 years later. In Omar El Akkad's book One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, he writes, 'The moral component of history, the most necessary component, is simply a single question, asked over and over again: When it mattered, who sided with justice and who sided with power? What makes moments such as this one so dangerous, so clarifying, is that one way or another everyone is forced to answer.' [ Occupied Territories Bill: former Ceann Comhairle 'confident' Government will include ban on services Opens in new window ] We cannot wait to reflect with hindsight. We need to answer that question now. Time and time again, when Ireland has led, others have followed. Recognising Palestinian statehood, for example, was not merely symbolic, it was also a catalyst, one which other countries are following. The Occupied Territories Bill, including trade in services, can act as another catalyst, where Ireland can lead on a global movement of the boycott, divestment and sanctioning of Israel. The reflection that will then occur in time can be one where Ireland can be seen as a beacon in dark times, a small nation that did everything it could to illuminate a path out of this horrific mire. The people of Ireland protesting have secured their legacy in this moment. Now it's time for our legislators to live up to such aspirations.
Irish Times
7 hours ago
- Irish Times
Which TDs and Senators live in rented homes? Why so few? Does it matter?
With as few as eight of Ireland's national politicians living in private rental accommodation, the proportion of TDs and Senators who are renting is significantly lower than among the population as a whole. The plight of renters in Ireland is one of the issues at the forefront of the debate over the housing crisis . The opposition has attacked successive governments for not stemming spiralling rents, which have exceeded an average of €2,000 per month around the country for the first time in 2025. The current Coalition has announced reforms aimed at boosting private investment to build more housing in the hope that this will bring down rents. READ MORE At the same time it is seeking to strengthen tenant protections with a new national system of rent controls and better security of tenure. Just five TDs and three Senators confirmed they are renters in response to a survey carried out by The Irish Times in recent weeks. The TDs are Sinn Féin housing spokesman Eoin Ó Broin , Fine Gael 's Barry Ward and Kiera Keogh , along with Sinéad Gibney and Eoin Hayes of the Social Democrats . The Senators who confirmed they are renting are Laura Harmon of the Labour Party and Anne Rabbitte and Shane Curley of Fianna Fáil . Some others, such as Minister for Housing James Browne and Social Democrats housing spokesman Rory Hearne , own their own homes but confirmed they had been renters for several years. In addition to being renters, both Ward and Gibney are landlords, with one property each. They are two of about 30 landlords among TDs and Senators who indicated they have residential properties in Dáil and Seanad register-of-interests declarations. It would seem that landlords outnumber renters by some distance among the politicians in Leinster House. The eight politicians who rent represent 11 per cent – little more than one in 10 – of the 74 Oireachtas members who responded to the survey. The remainder of the 234 Oireachtas members did not answer the survey, so the precise proportion of renters in Leinster House has not necessarily been revealed. The eight confirmed renters represents just 3 per cent of the overall number of TDs and Senators. Whether the true proportion of renters in Leinster House is closer to 11 per cent or 3 per cent, it is still well below the rate of people living in rental accommodation in Ireland. The proportion of tenants in the private rental sector in the population generally is about one in five or 20 per cent. So, what are the reasons for the low number of renters in Leinster House? For one thing, the age profile in Leinster House tends to be older than the general population – by about 10 years at the start of the last Dáil, when the average age of TDs was 48.5. Ó Broin says younger people are more likely to rent. He also cites those with a modest income; renters where the head of household was born outside of Ireland; and people who owned a home but now rent as a result of relationship breakdown or mortgage distress, as other groups among tenants in the private rental sector. 'In some senses the Oireachtas isn't representative of the population as a whole so its tenure breakdown probably isn't representative either,' says Ó Broin, who notes that people in the Oireachtas 'have significantly higher incomes'. He also says 'any politician who's doing their constituency work properly will engage with large numbers of people in different types of housing situations [including renters]' while adding: 'of course the more representative your parliament is of people's real life experiences, I think, the better.' [ David McWilliams: An answer to Ireland's housing crisis is right behind us Opens in new window ] Ó Broin, now 53, has been renting since he was 18 and has been living in his current home in Clondalkin for 15 years. He has greater security of tenure than many renters. His landlord is the Church of Ireland and the deeds of the property he lives in stipulate that it must not be sold. He is aware that other renters are less secure. 'I deal with lots of cases of people in their 50s and 60s who are renting and when circumstances change they're in very precarious situations.' He is critical of Government efforts to grow the private rental sector, saying 'renting is volatile by its very nature' and, even with rent pressure zones , rents have risen faster than any income increases for most tenants in recent years. Will he ever seek to buy? 'You wouldn't get a mortgage at my age but also the insecurity of the employment [as a TD] is the other thing,' Ó Broin says. 'Buying a house isn't on my radar.' Harmon, who is based in Cork, says she does hope to buy in the coming years but knows she is fortunate to have a tenancy where she is comfortable to be living. 'I do hope to own my own home one day,' she says, but it is 'going to take me a couple of years before I'll be in a position to even look at that'. 'I know that a lot of people are even struggling to find somewhere to rent and somewhere they can afford,' says Harmon, who is a board member of housing charity Threshold She stood in the last general election on a platform of a 'generation who are locked out of the housing market' and says three of her sisters have left the country over the cost of living . 'They didn't see home ownership in their future,' she says. 'A lot of renters do aspire to home ownership but unfortunately that dream is being taken away from them because of the absolute enormity of the cost of homes in this country.' Ward and Gibney fall into a category that can perhaps best be described as accidental landlords. Ward, a TD for Dún Laoghaire, says he was lucky enough to have been able to buy a property in Dublin city before the economic crash and it was his home. However, once he was elected to the Oireachtas, he felt he needed to be living in his constituency and he also got married and started a family. 'It wasn't feasible to live in a one-bedroom apartment outside the constituency any more so we rent out of necessity.' He also says that when he moved out of his property it was in negative equity and he couldn't sell it 'without saddling myself with a significant additional debt'. He rents out the apartment. Ward, who also hopes to buy a house in the future, says his own experience of renting has been positive but that 'doesn't mean that I'm not aware of people who've had very negative experiences renting'. He says he knows this from meeting constituents who may have 'unscrupulous' landlords or be in 'dire financial circumstances' and facing rent increases – an issue he says the Government is seeking to address. [ Lorcan Sirr: How much do landlords in Ireland really earn? You might be surprised Opens in new window ] He also says: 'I think the discussion around landlords in the Dáil can sometimes suggest to people that TDs and Senators are out of touch when in fact nothing could be farther form the truth'. 'We are all in daily contact with people with different circumstances ... so we are very much aware of the pressures that people face around the country and around our constituencies in particular.' Gibney, as TD for Dublin-Rathdown, also owns a property but says: 'When I met and married my now husband our home was no longer appropriate for our blended family and so we now rent and I now rent out my home.' One politician who is neither a homeowner nor a renter is Labour's Eoghan Kenny , the youngest TD in the Dáil, who lives with his grandmother in Mallow, Co Cork. The 25-year-old is not alone among people his age, with almost 70 per cent of them living at home. The Cork North-Central TD says there's a couple of reasons he's living there. 'Number one – it's my home. I've lived there all my life'. But another reason is a 'lack of housing supply' and available rental accommodation in the town. 'I want to live in Mallow where my home base is and where my constituency office is. The only possible way I could live there is by living at home with my grandmother.'
Irish Times
7 hours ago
- Irish Times
Half of post-primary schools apply for phone pouch funding
Just over half of post-primary schools have applied for funding under the Government's phone pouches scheme. A total of 380 out of the country's 722 second-level schools have made applications under the €9 million plan, announced in the budget last year, to provide smartphone pouches or storage boxes to restrict the use of mobile phones by pupils during the school day. The initiative sparked criticism at the time and Opposition parties labelled it 'wasteful' and 'unnecessary' . But in reply to a parliamentary question from Labour education spokesman Eoghan Kenny, Minster for Education Helen McEntee confirmed that 380 schools had applied for funding of €25 per pupil by the June 24th deadline. READ MORE Payment has already been made to 304 schools and 'processing of the balance of those schools is under way, with funding to issue to eligible schools shortly'. The funding can only be used for pouches and phone lock boxes. Ms McEntee said the phone restriction policy 'will build on the existing school policies in this area and will enable children to disconnect from their online world and connect more with their peers for the duration of the school day. Consultation with the school community is a key feature of this measure'. However, Mr Kenny said phone pouches were far down the list of priorities for schools that had contacted him. 'The biggest issue for schools is the lack of funding for very basic things like electricity, heating, IT equipment, funding for caretakers, for example,' he said. He said they need funding to paint doors, walls and windows at the end of the year and 'there are so many additional costs that you need, to keep the school running as opposed to storing phones'. Mr Kenny, a former secondary school business studies and religion teacher said 'this amount of money could be used in a far better way than storing phones'. [ Schools told they cannot spend €9m phone pouch budget on other education needs Opens in new window ] He pointed to difficulties with the phone pouch policy. 'I'm not saying every child is going to do this but if you've a child of 15 or 16, they are going to bring in an old phone, put it into the phone pouch and then go off with their original phone. 'So it's not an effective way of actually stopping them from using their phones.' He acknowledged the Government's concerns about children's use of social media but said while there are issues in trying to keep students off phones, 'the majority of the time mobile phone policy in schools works'.
