Labour reconsiders running candidate for presidency

The Labour Party is reconsidering whether it should run a candidate in a presidential election this autumn. The party leadership feels that a bad performance against the incumbent, Mrs McAleese, could hand Fianna Fáil a much needed morale boost.

Meanwhile former MEP Ms Dana Rosemary Scallon has indicated that she will stand against Mrs McAleese.

While Labour leader Mr Pat Rabbitte has said the party should contest such an election as a matter of principle, sources said the party feared that a poor performance would give an election victory to the Government very soon after its setback in the local and European elections.

"Nobody wants to hand the Government an election victory on a plate but it is desirable that elected posts should be contested," said one party source.

Mrs McAleese has yet to declare whether she will seek a second seven-year term, but she is widely expected to renominate herself in July or September.

"There is no campaign team set up. The President has not announced to anybody what her intentions are and there have been no preparations undertaken for any election at this stage," said a spokeswoman for Mrs McAleese.

While Labour has not formally discussed the issue since the elections last Friday week, sources said Mr Rabbitte was likely to reach a definitive position on the matter before the end of July.

The sources said it remained the party's position that presidential elections should be contested.

They indicated, however, that some in the party believed it would be unwise politically to contest an election in which the party had a slim chance of success so soon after the Government's poor performance in the local and European polls.

Labour's most likely candidate, Mr Michael D. Higgins TD, said yesterday that he had yet to consider whether he would allow his name to to go forward if the party was to contest such an election. "I said I'd consider it after the European and local elections and I haven't considered it yet," he said.

Dana was an unsuccessful candidate in the 1997 presidential election that brought Mrs McAleese to power.

Her brother and campaign manager, Mr John Browne, strongly hinted that she will run against Mrs McAleese but said she would not declare her position until the President made it clear whether she will be seeking a second term.

Mr Browne said his sister's likely candidacy was justified on two grounds. First, he said it would be undemocratic to allow Mrs McAleese renominate herself without a contest.

Second, he said it was important to campaign against the draft constitution agreed last Friday at the EU summit in Brussels.

He said the constitution would give Europe a legal personality in its own right, superseding the Irish Constitution. "She's not against Europe but she is against the primacy of an EU constitution over the Irish Constitution so the primacy of Ireland's Constitution must be maintained."