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A FINE GAEL councillor in Lucinda Creighton’s constituency has thrown her support behind the former junior minister amid calls for her resignation from the party in the wake of her public opposition to a number of government measures in recent weeks.
Edie Wynne, a councillor for the Pembroke-Rathmines ward, has said that Creighton retains support among members in the local Fine Gael organisation in Dublin South East and has accused those against the local TD of “speaking more loudly” than those who support her.
“I hope and wish that matters will be resolved,” Wynne told TheJournal.ie yesterday, adding that it is her wish that Creighton, who lost the Fine Gael whip over the abortion vote last July, remains in the party.
Her comments are in contrast to those from her Fine Gael colleague in the same Dublin City Council constituency, councillor Paddy McCartan, who has called on Creighton to resign from the party.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio 1 on Monday, McCartan cited Creighton’s opposition to the abolition of the Seanad and her criticism of some Budget measures last week as being “incompatible” with Fine Gael.
Creighton has previously told this website she will run at the next general election and insisted that she has the support of a lot of Fine Gael members in her constituency since she lost the party whip.
She faces having to run in the next general election as an independent or Reform Alliance candidate with Fine Gael not likely to allow her back into the parliamentary party.
It has already been suggested that the Fine Gael leadership will look to run Senator Catherine Noone in the new Dublin Bay South constituency along with sitting TD Eoghan Murphy.
However Noone is understood to be reluctant to run in that constituency if Creighton, a close friend, also runs as an independent or other party candidate. It is also unclear if Creighton will be allowed run as an independent if she is still a member of Fine Gael.
Wynne said yesterday that she regretted what has happened since Creighton’s decision to vote against the abortion bill last July which saw her and four other TDs expelled from the parliamentary party.
Wynne said: “I’ve known her [Creighton] since when she was in Young Fine Gael. She was always very bright and articulate and a hardworking TD, popular in the constituency and admired.”
Wynne said a lot of people in the local Fine Gael party are “confused” about the current situation.
“They like somebody as a person but are not liking the action she is taking at a moment when the government is working so hard to get the country back on its feet,” she said.
“They have mixed feelings based on allegiances to Fine Gael and allegiances to her. There are some people who are strongly against her, and other people are very committed to her.
Asked about what level of support Creighton has, Wynne said: “I’d say people who are against her speak more loudly [but that] doesn’t necessarily mean there are more of them.”
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Rest in Peace..
With no disrespect to the deceased or his family, garda forensic team only need to see the video… Brush up and open the road….its obvious to a blind man what happened. RIP
Close the comments.
With no disrespect to the deceased, he could have killed someone else, absolutely shocking driving down the fast lane of a motorway in the wrong direction
It was obviously a mistake.
@Shane McGrath: was it? I’d find it hard to believe that he could make that same mistake for so long he seemed to be going down the motorway for a long time nevermind all the signs Saying do not enter when entering the On ramp if it was a 20 year old young lad who did the same there wouldn’t be this kind of sympathy.
@James: This happened to me before on the M9. Met an elderly man driving towards us while we were in the ‘over taking/ fast lane’ – thankfully we noticed it in time and there was nothing on our inside so that we managed to avoid the man. It was terrifying, rang the guards and alls they could say was ‘Yes we are aware of that’.
RIP to the poor man.
Comments should be closed.
That can quite easily happen anyone especially on that part of the road, the brutal signage and the maze of roundabouts on the slip roads is atrocious. There is very often roadworks that regularly has you driving in the other side too.
I nearly got caught out coming out McDonalds last year late at night when signs from roadworks that had finished were not removed.
@Da Dell: they drove by plenty of cars heading the other direction and should have pulled into the hard shoulder of it was a mistake, horrible anyway for everyone involved
Terrible for the mans family but it’s happening too often on that road.
Twice I’ve been driving to Dublin in the outside lane and you see a dot coming towards you …it takes seconds to realise its a car on the wrong side of the Motorway and you move in pretty quickly and hope anyone behind you see’s the car.It’s usually an elderly man on his own to be honest
The woman in the red car got out pretty quickly after the crash
@silveryD: I genuinely don’t know how she managed to get out of the car that quickly it definitely saved her life thats for sure.
For the frequency that this happens , as we do seem to see rarely byt enough to come up with something. and seeing all the cars trying to warn people on the opposite side of the road, we should come up with some universal warning like , if someone holds their horn down this means to tell the other side of the road to pull in.
@Roisin Brennan: the thing is, once you realise where do you go?
Wonder if this man’s doctor gave him okay recently to have licence. Obviously he had some form of dementia.
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