Brendan Howlin
FEATHERS THEN LABOUR TD Colm Keaveney received a white feather in his internal Leinster House mailbox in 2012 with a message that said: “This traditional White Feather is presented to you for your cowardice and betrayal of the Irish people. May this great shame be inherited by your children’s children for all time, may your name become [sic] a byword for infamy.” Keaveney had breached Labour’s austerity agenda by refusing to support welfare budget cuts then being implemented by austerity junkie Brendan Howlin, who was then the minister for public expenditure and reform.
Can Howlin expect to receive a white feather from remaining Labour Party members – survivors – now that he has jumped ship? And will Seán Sherlock, someone who regarded himself as party leadership material and who was often accused of minding his seat rather than the party’s overall interests, be remembered with fondness and gratitude by his former red rose comrades following his exit?
There was little keening from party members at the departure of the two TDs who were once regarded by leadership electoral strategists as the only two who could have confidence in retaining their seats (see The Phoenix 8/4/22). Admittedly, Sherlock was dealt a blow with the transfer of his Mallow base from Cork East to Cork North-Central. And Howlin’s Wexford constituency was cut from five seats to four, with Sinn Féin poised to take a second seat, most likely at Howlin’s expense if he had stuck around.
Howlin’s rhetoric about continuing to fight for a Labour seat in Wexford in particular provoked hollow laughter from the comrades. For both senior parliamentarians to simply throw in the towel as the party faces virtual extinction seems like political behavior far more deserving of white feathers than Keaveney’s defense of traditional Labour policy.
If these two Labour TDs have retired from the fray before an electoral shot has even been fired, then what are the prospects for those with less ‘distinguished’ CVs?
Ivana Bacik
Aodhán Ó Ríordáin lost his seat in 2016 but covered every blade of grass in Dublin Bay North (DBN) to regain it in 2020. SF, however, is reasserting itself in the polls and may run three candidates in DBN, while the Soc Dems housing spokesperson, Cian O’Callaghan TD, is likely to retain his seat here, meaning that Ó Ríordáin is in serious danger of losing his seat for the second time.
Also in north Dublin, the new, split constituencies of Fingal East and Fingal West means that Labour TD Duncan Smith will face Fianna Fáil housing minister Darragh O’Brien, Fine Gael TD Alan Farrell, and an SF candidate in the three-seat constituency. A very strong anti-Government backlash will be needed to assist Smith on top of the gains SF will likely make here.
Alan Kelly’s fate will be decided by possibly two tests: one at the EU elections in June and the other in Tipperary at the general election, whenever that occurs. If Kelly does take a European seat he would be well advised to hang on to it.
Louth TD Ged Nash is a rather more serious politician than many of the now failed careerists in Labour but he is not safe either, with SF taking 42% of first-preference votes at the last election compared with Nash’s 8.2%.
SF will surely run three candidates this time, and Nash only survived last time around thanks to a massive 3,021 transfers from the Green Party on the last count. These will not be available at the next general election.
This leaves party leader Ivana Bacik, who beat all parties at the by-election in Dublin Bay South two years ago. Whether Bacik can survive in the more arduous general election against Government parties and SF is a difficult question to answer. If she does, will she have a parliamentary party to lead?
