FF councillor must be disciplined - group

The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, was yesterday urged to discipline a Fianna Fáil councillor over comments made this week in relation to the Traveller community.

Speaking at Monday's monthly meeting of Ennis Town Council, Cllr Michael Guilfoyle had said, "Travellers can't even bury their own without killing each other before and after, and we are supposed to be looking after these people?" Cllr Guilfoyle made his comments after a Traveller funeral in Ennis last week, which required a large-scale security operation and passed off peacefully - facts acknowledged by Cllr Guilfoyle before he made his statement.

Mr Martin Collins of the Pavee Point Travellers' Centre said yesterday that Mr Ahern needed to come down heavy on Cllr Guilfoyle and discipline him.

"The Fianna Fáil leadership needs to take stronger action against its members who make inflammatory racist comments. It failed recently when Noel O'Flynn made comments over asylum-seekers so it needs to show a very firm hand and discipline this councillor.

"Coming up to an election where politicians might play the race card, it is important that Mr Ahern takes action." Mr Collins said that Cllr Guilfoyle's comments could do a lot of damage to relations between the Travelling and settled communities in Ennis, relations which organisations like his own were trying to foster.

"His comments are quite dangerous and have the potential to legitimise vigilantism. It is very irresponsible for any public representative to make inflammatory comments, and runs the risk of inciting hatred." Mr Collins said that, with the Prohibition of Incitement to Hatred Act 1989 being such a weak piece of legislation where the only conviction was overturned on appeal last year, the onus is on Mr Ahern to take action in this instance.

The funeral of Thomas Doherty (19) was held last week after he died last month as a result of a fatal stabbing in Dublin. Yesterday his brother, Mr Michael Doherty, said Cllr Guilfoyle's comments showed a lack of respect to Thomas's memory.

"His comments are racist and hard to understand when there was no trouble at the funeral."

This week's comments by Cllr Guilfoyle are not the first to anger minorities in Ennis. At a council meeting last October, he said the "bullying and intimidation by Travellers is getting way out of hand", while at a meeting last June he said that "someone is going to have to shout stop", after claiming that the town's 600 asylum-seekers were causing rents to increase.

A Fianna Fáil spokesman said the party would "be dealing with the reported comments by Cllr Guilfoyle ourselves". He said each member of the party had recently signed an anti-racism pledge recording their abhorrence of racism in any shape or form.