Can we have a thread to discuss the upcoming MEP Election candidates for Ireland?

[HornyHornersPinkyWinky]

European elections coming up on 7th June. Ireland has 14 seats to fill...

I know it's probably early days, but I got a shiny leaflet in the door from Barry Andrews talking about how great he is - sorry Barry but you're not getting my vote.

It got me thinking though, I have no idea who to vote for. Here's a website which lists all the candidates, if you scroll down you will see the constituencies and if you click on their faces it gives you more information about their policies etc.
https://www.europeanmovement.ie/european-elections-2024/#1708343079798-db46201b-445f

Is there anyone dead set on who they are voting for and willing to share? I'm in Dublin BTW. Actually, if I could I'd vote for Peadar Tobín, but he's in the Midlands constituency...

@OchonAgusOchonOh they vary. But any local to me are out n about morning noon and night at every event going. I would say it is a very busy time. We had three parties after each other on Friday.@

I have a feeling you won't hear anything back. I emailed similar before several times to my local TDs, and apart from the acknowledgement email I got nothing.

I think politicians still don't want to touch this issue with a bargepole, and will avoid it as long as they possibly can, they see it as political suicide, and women and girls are just the collateral damage to that.

Unfortunately we have been very slow to deal with this issue in Ireland - the media are avoiding it and the government don't care. They won't care until voters force them to care. They don't want to admit they created this shitshow by voting in the GRC, and want us to pretend it's all fine and nothing to see here folks.

I heard John McGuirk speak at an event I attended recently, and he talked about how he had spoken to several politicians personally about gender identity and the GRC, and he said quite a few of them didn't seem to understand the implications of the law (i.e. that a man could legally be classed as a woman if he fills out a form etc.) or they just seemed incredulous, and didn't want to know about it. Basically head in the sand stuff.

It's infuriating.

When I email my local politicians about issues where we agree I get a fairly quick response. It may be different at the moment with elections coming up but I've found whenever I email them on this issue I get nothing back.
I suppose @OchonAgusOchonOh it would be an idea to get someone else to email on a non-controversial topic and see if they get a reply.

That's an excellent idea.

Let me know how it goes!

Half the country will be living overseas soon enough. Airbnb outnumbers normal rentals in Ireland 14/1 according to an article in today's Guardian. Actually one of my adult children is moving to Berlin. Rents are cheaper , stuff works and employment prospects are good.

Thank f*ck we didn't Irexit. Sorry . Don't mean to derail - just rant!

@OchonAgusOchonOh I got a very prompt reply from a TD no less about changes to our local bus timetable.

Why didn't I think to ask a supplementary question about mixed toilets and women's prisons etc!
It's a good ploy

You can always reply, thanking him/her and saying you have another question. Much harder to ignore you when they've already sent a reply to a different one.

We got a leaflet from Aishling Considine from Aontú in the door, and they actually mention gender ideology and it being problematic. I think I'm swinging towards her for that alone.
Yes, I aware of their views on abortion, which I don't agree with, but that would require another referendum to implement.

Just to clarify - a referendum would not be required to outlaw abortion. The changed wording in the constitution states: "Provision may be made by law for the regulation of termination of pregnancy."

Theoretically, a government could decide to ban abortion and still be constitutional. Now, I think it would be political suicide for a government to do that at the moment but if Aontú managed to form a majority government (not happening, I know), they could ban abortion.

I too am thinking of Aontu, despite not agreeing with their stance on abortion and knowing Peadar Tóbín is ex Sinn Féin because the Government parties aren't listening to the people who voted for them.
Crime is awful. Yet our Minister for Justice thinks everything is grand.
She's a very pretty woman but a woeful Minister for Justice and Law reform.
Soft sentencing for awful crimes - judges in the past (still working today) were political appointees.
Building to rent owned by big international landlords 🙄is not what people want. But Minister for Housing, Daragh O' Brien isn't listening.
You wouldn't want to have to go to A&E in Ireland 😮😮😮😮
As for Eamon Ryan and his cohorts......
Wasn't it Roderic O' Gorman who tweeted in 8 different languages in 2021 that people would have their "own door" within 4 months when they came to Ireland.
During a housing crisis.
No wonder we have a migrant crisis daily, with tents being removed.

Like telling unhappy children they can have a new body in a couple of years. Roderic is putting Santy out of a job.

Fair enough, to be honest it doesn't worry me the way that other things do at the moment. Like I said for me it's about picking the least worst option.

I think for all of us, it's about picking the least worst option. I just didn't want people thinking we're home and free with abortion.

To be honest I'd hate to be trying to run the country. It's a tough job.

It certainly is, and so many people seem to be working from the assumption that politicians are all 'in it for what they can get out of it', whatever that is - OK a bit of power in a tiny island off mainland Europe, and what my father used to call 'decent screw' [it meant good wages back then!] but at an increasing cost to their wellbeing and these days, actual safety.

I don't buy the 'they are making thousands of people suffer with their laws' defence to the physical intimidation of elected reps. Laws are not usually made here with the intention of causing widespread suffering [not an easy sell at the next election..] whereas trapping someone in a car or picketing their family home has the declared intention of making them suffer.

We fought for centuries to become a democratic republic, and until somebody comes up with a viable alternative, we have to make a go of the one we went through so much to achieve. That includes a majority of the voters electing TDs who form a government, and then a majority of voters voting them out of office if they don't want them to continue in office. Communicating to your public reps that you'd like them to 'do different' is part of the process; intimidating people out of public life isn't.

What scares me is that the online and real life abuse and intimidation faced by candidates is going to filter out anyone running for office who hasn't a loud mouth and a brass neck and an ego the size of the Atlantic. Your average Jo/e isn't going to have the resilience to face the abuse = fewer Ordinary Jo/e TDs, when we actually need more of them to represent us ordinary Jo/e citizens.

I think I’ll be voting right wing at European level and left wing at local. The parties really need to get their heads around immigration, it’s the main issue pushing me to the right. Hopefully a stronger right wing in the EU will focus minds in this regard, even if they don’t win a huge number of seats.

Crime is awful. Yet our Minister for Justice thinks everything is grand.
She's a very pretty woman but a woeful Minister for Justice and Law reform.

She was voted in and appointed to the role purely because of who her dad was and people feeling sorry for her. An incompetent from start to finish.

One of my local TDs is not running next time. He told a neighbour ' anyone from a governing party is going to get dog's abuse on the doorstep!'
He is FG but not the worst as they say

Helen McEntee is incompetent and looks clueless all the time. Her main interest is pushing the hate bill no doubt because of her husband's job. She's been banging on about how Dublin is safe while she has gardai protecting her yet her colleague Mary Butler has stated she doesn't walk down Grafton Street or go for a stroll at lunchtime because it's a thing of the past due to safety concerns.

What is Helen Mc Entee's husband's job @honeyrider ?
You say she's pushing the hate bill because of his job.

I want someone strong in Justice !
She is not suited to the job.

This is the opposite of what I’ll be doing. I’ll be voting centrist to minimise the influence of the far right - Green, then mainstream. I believe centrist parties will adopt a slightly-right stance on law and order, justice, etc but maintain a humanitarian focus. Vote right wing, and that’s what you’ll get. IMHO we need as a nation to mitigate against hard RW that will emanate from Hungary, Poland, etc.

I have never felt so unrepresented by the choice of candidates in both the EU and local elections. I would be a natural SD, Labour, Green voter but I am so disillusioned with all the parties right now. It will be a cold day in hell before I would vote for the national party or any of their ilk. I will likely vote Green in the locals as a personal vote for the candidate. I am still not over how they were all willing to do such damage to carers and people living with disability in the last referendum. I just want someone who knows who is a decent human being and who knows what a woman is and is not a racist/hateful asshole.

I would probably agree with you except for the position of the more left wing parties on women's rights. I will never vote green while they maintain their current position that supports any male who claims to be a woman accessing female spaces

That's exactly how I feel. I'm a left of centre voter normally.

I haven’t seen enough of a shift from the centrist parties on law and order, justice, immigration etc to justify voting for them unfortunately. I’m sure we’ll have a general election coming soon and a spike in the right wing representation might encourage the centrists to take a harder line on these matters. In general I think the EU skews too far left, so I am ok with voting to redress that.

I don’t share the general MN concern over trans issues, so they don’t factor into my voting choices (apart from making me more uneasy about voting for Aontu and company). My usual inclination would be someone like the SocDems.