Fingal County Council to pursue “ethical-based” procurement policy

Fingal County Council has passed a motion that will compel the council to pursue an “ethical-based” procurement policy.

The motion was proposed by Sinn Féin councillors Angela Donnelly, Breda Hanaphy, Malachy Quinn and John Smyth.

The motion called for Fingal County Council to adopt an ethical procurement policy, in accordance with United Nations guiding principles on business and human rights.

Speaking at this week’s meeting of Fingal County Council, councillor Donnelly said “the purpose of this initiative is to ethically advance how councils across Ireland tender and who they affilitated to, in accordance to international law obligations.”

“This is a framework, to ensure that no council in Ireland will be able to financially aid businesses and companies investing, practising or complicit in human rights abuses.”

“By adopting an ethical procurement policy’ this council will be able to implement a process, albeit it at council level, to exclude businesses and companies involved in human rights and international law violations when tendering bids,” the Ongar councillor said.

Donnelly noted that five councils across Ireland have already adopted a similar motion; Limerick, Clare, Wicklow, Louth and Tipperary. 

Fine Gael councillor Ted Leddy said, “I was going to sound a word of caution because I’m quite familiar with the public procurement process as is; when I read this motion I thought we were adding another layer of bureaucracy to the procurement process but I don’t think that’s the case having heard councillor Donnelly speak on it.”

Smyth said “like most people, I’ve been horrified over the last couple of years over the level of death and devastation and ethnic cleansing that’s occurring across the globe. This is now coupled with effective gaslighting of whole societies and communities. As a parent, seeing images of children being killed in warzones makes you feel incredibly powerless.”

“It begs the question to me if we really are powerless. We are a small country, but on a national scale our impact has always been great. We’ve always punched well above our weight. Small actions can have those ripple effects that really make a difference.”

“As a council, we are always airing our frustration at how little power we have and it being eroded, but this motion represents a motion where we can make a meaningful difference.”

Smyth noted the tricolour, the flag of Ukraine and the national flag of Palestine are flown outside Fingal County Council HQ, which he says is a “lovely sentiment” but it is “completely hypocritical if we don’t back that up with meaningful action.” 

Green councillor David Healy said the motion is “very important; it’s good we have the opportunity to push in the right direction, however small.”

“It’s up to us to take the opportunity,” he said.

Solidarity councillor John Burtchaell says “there are complicit corporations all around us who are profiting from colossal crimes against humanity; if anything can be done to make them pay for their role in this obscenity that is to be welcomed.”

“We have seen ordinary people boycotting some of the worst corporations who have looked to benefit from the genocide – I’m talking at McDonald’s and Starbucks in particular – their profits have been hit by ordinary people taking action.”

He said that democratic chambers such as Fingal County Council should “follow the lead taken by ordinary people.”

To Burtchaell’s point, an early 2024 report from McDonald’s corporate wing found that the boycott, which was instigated following the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war in October 2023, “meaningfully impacted” McDonald’s global profits, and 2023 statistics for McDonald’s in Ireland found that McDonald’s pre-tax profits declined by 16%.

Independent councillor Jimmy Guerin said, “I don’t think regardless of any motion us flying any Palestinian, tricolour or Ukranian flag will be seen as anyone as hypocritical.”

“We don’t have to prove our commitment to the people who are suffering. We will all support the motion but what we’ve got to realise is if it’s within our gift and let the government know our position.”

“It’s very important, that regardless of the motion, that more people see the three flags and they know our integrity is not in doubt and our commitment to team is not in doubt.”

Labour councillor and Mayor of Fingal County Council Brian McDonagh said there while there may be national and international complexities surrounding procurement law, he supported the motion.

“If we hit obstacles that are imposed from elsewhere, we will try to overcome them.”

Fingal County Council manager Oliver Hunt noted that Fingal County Council operates under Irish and European law surrounding procurement and the oversight now lies with the Department of Public Expenditure.

“We can’t operate outside the law in relation to procurement,” he told the meeting.

In November South Dublin County Council passed a motion that would make the area an “apartheid-free zone” and boycott all Israeli goods with the meeting being told that the boycott of South African goods by Dunnes workers in the 1980s set a precedent.