Ó Ríordáin confirms Europe bid

Labour TD Aodhán Ó Ríordáin has confirmed his ambitions to run for Europe.

The Dublin Bay North TD told the Sunday Independent that the recent riots in Dublin served as a “lightbulb” moment.

“You really get the sense that everything that had been creeping up has now exploded and I don’t think we have enough leadership in Dublin to talk about Dublin on any level, on any platform at all.”

“A huge amount of the energy in the Dáil chamber is about rural Ireland,” Ó Ríordaín stated, and that Dublin is “being allowed to die” from being too expensive to live in.

“The cultural heart of the city being stripped away and there is creeping sense of the place being unsafe,” he said.

Ó Ríordáin’s constituency of Dublin Bay North lost a significant chunk of voters in the recent Dáil constituency redraws, and coupled with Labour’s stagnating polling nationwide, it can be surmised the Ó Ríordáin may fancy his chances as an MEP instead of facing re-election as a TD.

First elected in 2011 amid the nationwide Labour wave, Ó Ríordáin served in various Minster of State roles in the 31st Dáil before losing re-election in 2016 as voters punished Labour for their participation in the Fine Gael coalition.

After a stint as a Senator, Ó Ríordáin won re-election back to the Dáil in 2020.

Up until now, Labour Senator Annie Hoey was considered the most high-profile sitting Labour politician to secure the nomination, with Fingal Councillor Rob O’Donoghue also expressing interest in being Labour’s candidate on the ballot, but the entry of a sitting TD and former Minister of State will mean that Ó Ríordáin will become the favourite to be Labour’s candidate for Europe.

“I’ve spent enough time now through my life, trying to change drug policy for people that people don’t like, or trying to advocate for groups on the margins of society that people instinctively don’t have an awful lot of regard for, and I’m not going to change now,” Ó Ríordáin said.

“I look at the things we’ve won over the last 10 years: marriage equality, repeal, a better sense of ourselves; our feeling that we’re now world leaders in progressive politics is under absolute assault and they just set O’Connell Street on fire.”

“When you’re an MEP, you have a mandate from the people of Dublin to speak to things,” he added.

Labour hasn’t elected an MEP from Dublin since Proinsias De Rossa in 2009, with Emer Costello serving out the remainder of his term after stepping down in early 2012.

Labour’s candidate in 2019, Alex White, secured 5% of first preferences in 2019, nowhere near enough to secure a seat, placing below future Social Democrats TD Gary Gannon on the day and a full 5% behind Lynn Boylan in her unsuccessful re-election bid.

Senator Hoey, recently appointed Labour’s spokesperson on Dublin issues, told the Sunday Independent she intends to seek the Labour nomination, stating that climate action is needed “before Europe burns”

Hoey stated that there is a need to “counteract the far-right stirring hate against the migrant community, and against women and LGBTQ people.”

“I have hope for Dublin. I believe that with young queer people like me representing Dublin in Europe, we can build a future based on hope and solidarity.”

The left-of-centre vote is already heavily fragmented in Dublin, with Sinn Féin running two candidates next year.

Senator Lynn Boylan looking to regain the European seat that she lost in 2019, while veteran Councillor Daithí Doolan is also making a bid for Europe.

Based on current polling, left-wing MEP Clare Daly looks likely to retain her seat, while Green MEP Ciáran Cuffe appears fairly comfortable in his bid to secure re-election, albeit unlikely to repeat his poll-topping performance from 2019.

However, Ó Ríordáin criticised what he perceived as Sinn Féin’s failure to “robustly” condemn the far-right and said he is “embarrassed” by Daly’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine as well as her general anti-NATO positions.

The Dublin constituency has been thrown a curveball in the form of Fine Gael MEP Frances Fitzgerald confirming she will not be running next June.

Fitzgerald’s decision to not seek re-election has caused sitting Fine Gael TD Josepha Madigan to seek the party’s support for Europe, while the Irish Examiner has reported in recent weeks that former TDs Noel Rock and Kate O’Connell are looking to be Fine Gael’s name on the ballot next June.