PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE Michael D Higgins has described the ethos in Ireland over the past 15 years as “corrosive” and “deadly”.
Speaking at a breakfast organised by The Wheel, an umbrella group representing more than 800 charities and not-for-profit organisations, Mr Higgins and a number of other candidates were asked to outline their vision for Irish society in the years ahead.
“I am speaking about a real republic. I have openly said I do not seek to recreate the corrosive, deadly vision of the last 15 years based on radical individualism.”
The Labour Party TD said his manifesto was based on the principle of inclusive citizenship in a creative society that would generate “an Irishness completely different from recent times”.
Six of the seven candidates spoke at the breakfast, with only Dana Rosemary Scallon absent.
Like Mr Higgins, many of the candidates portrayed themselves as the candidate of change.
Sinn Féin’s Martin McGuinness described himself as a “change-maker”, citing the peace process.
“Quite clearly many people in the North thought that there was never a prospect of peace, that the conflict would go on forever but we made change happen,” he said.
Mr McGuinness said his pledge to take only the average Irish wage if elected and use the remainder of his presidential salary to employ six people currently on the dole was of symbolic importance.
“The bigger message is that the era of selfishness and greed that has consumed this country over recent times has to be brought to an end.
“We need people who are going to stand up and say this is not acceptable, change must happen.”
Independent candidate Seán Gallagher implored those gathered to rediscover a “lost” sense of community. “Your communities will not happen, they will not grow, on their own. They need to be developed and shaped and it is us, not as passengers, but as the drivers that will create that change,” he said.
Mary Davis offered a voice for those working in voluntary organisations through her promised conventions to address social issues.
“I would see that the result of those conventions would be fed into the system to see that change happened,” she said.
Senator David Norris pledged that he would “ask the Government respectfully” to invite the presidents of France and the United States to attend the centenary commemoration of 1916, where he would encourage them to “not just cherish all the children of the nation equally, but all the children of the planet”.
Fine Gael’s Gay Mitchell said he was standing for election because the country found itself at an “important crossroads”.