MITCHELL CAMPAIGN:FINE GAEL leader Enda Kenny has told his party's TDs and Senators to "get the lead out" in the campaign for the the European Parliament, the local authorities and the Dáil byelections on June 5th.
But the Opposition leader has not yet decided what advice to give Fine Gael supporters regarding transfers to other parties. “The people want change, they want Fianna Fáil out, we’re very clear on how to do that,” he said.
Speaking at the launch of Fine Gael MEP Gay Mitchell’s campaign for re-election, Mr Kenny said: “I’ve just come from a parliamentary party meeting where I laid it on the line to the Fine Gael Oireachtas members . . .”
As for advising supporters on transfers, he said: “I haven’t decided anything to do with transfers yet. There’s a lot of assessment in the field at the moment, we’ll look at the situation that arises from that.”
Meanwhile, Mr Mitchell refused to rule out running for the Dáil in the next general election. “Let’s take one step at a time,” he told reporters at an open-air news conference in St Stephen’s Green.
Faced with a similar choice prior to the 2007 general election, Mr Mitchell opted to step down as TD for Dublin South-Central and focus on his MEP role.
He said he had learned a lot from his time as MEP: “I want to put that to work in the coming term of the parliament and let’s take one step at a time, I don’t know when the general election will come.”
Asked if he would be interested in becoming the first directly elected mayor of Dublin, Mr Mitchell said: he was “very happy” in the European Parliament. “There isn’t even a vacancy, there isn’t even a position.”
Commenting on Bertie Ahern’s ambivalent responses on the matter, the Fine Gael leader called for a clear statement of intent from the former taoiseach.
“We have this man who is a former minister, former taoiseach . . . in all of those years you can search and search and you find it very difficult to figure out what he’s actually saying. Maybe I should invite him to say now, ‘Yes, I would like to compete for the job of Lord Mayor of Dublin’ . . .”
Commenting on the widespread advertising for Libertas candidate Caroline Simons, the Fine Gael leader said: “Money will not win this, this is about trust . . . it’s about an agenda, and our agenda is for a very strong Ireland to be at the heart of a very strong Europe”with Gay Mitchell central to that.