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FIANNA FÁIL TD and party whip, Seán Ó Fearghaíl, has joined the growing calls for the independent TD Mick Wallace to resign his seat following revelations that he under declared VAT returns before he took office.
It comes amid a report from RTÉ tonight that the government has begun attempts to have the Dáil discuss a motion of censure of Wallace.
The government chief whip did not return messages tonight while the government said only that no course of action had been finalised in relation to the independent TD.
Earlier, Wallace agreed to leave the Dáil Technical Group after being asked to do so by independent members of the group while the Ceann Comhairle Seán Barret denied the Wexford deputy’s request for speaking time in the Dáil tomorrow to offer a personal explanation.
Wallace has come in for considerable criticism and calls for his resignation after he disclosed last week that he had knowingly under declared the VAT his company, M and J Wallace Ltd, owed to the Revenue Commissioners.
He reached a settlement of €2.1 million with the tax authorities which he now says he cannot repay as the company is insolvenet.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie today, Ó Fearghaíl said: “Personally, should he resign? Yes I think he probably should however I think he’s made it quite clear that he has no intention of doing that.”
The Fianna Fáil TD for Kildare South said he had not been informed of any motion of censure being in the works but said his party would support it if it came to fruition.
The independent TD and Technical Group whip Catherine Murphy questioned whether there were grounds for such a censure motion given that Wallace’s settlement was reached prior to him taking office last year.
She told TheJournal.ie: “I would have to see what it was. If it was unprecedented, I don’t want any precedent created that would be used in the future inappropriately.”
Murphy said she had formally requested that the government chief whip, Paul Kehoe, schedule time in the Dáil this week for the matter to be addressed.
Kehoe did not return requests for comment.
When asked if the government was formulating a censure motion, a spokesperson for the Taoiseach’s office told TheJournal.ie: “No course of action has been finalised by government.”
Mick Wallace could not be reached for comment.
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RTE did record a lot of stuff on tape, which was at the time prohibitively expensive, and was as a matter of course, recorded over, in order to cut costs.
Sad, but nothing unusual, as even the BBC did likewise, consigning much of their earlier stuff to the dustbin of history. Even now, many BBC releases, such as Dad’s Army, are partly comprised of home recordings made by viewers.
What stood to RTE was that they were more reliant on film, and as such that tended to survive.
As a matter of fact, RTE have an excellent repository, as borne out by much of Brendan Balfe’s work, down through the years. It’s a fairly safe bet that he will have a hand in this project. I have to give them credit for this, as a history buff myself, I’ll find it interesting.
Balfe relies on audio, and probably a personal archive too, video is very different. My problem is not with reusing tape but recording over significant footage blithely.
Haven’t they wiped most of the stuff before 1980? No Late Late archive to speak of and hardly any home produced programming from 60s has survived.
We’ll soon find out.
Think of the physical space required to keep long running shows like the Late Late or the Den archived – it’s no surprise they couldn’t keep it all!
Wonder if they’ll have that Prime Time Investigates show up?
Seriously though, I can’t imagine an organisation as overpaid and inept as RTE having the amount of organisation and talent it takes to organise a serious archive.
Haven’t they wiped a huge amount of stuff? No Late Late archive to speak of and little or no home produced programming from 60s has survived.
Yep.
Would they show the famous prime time interview c. 1997 of the fine gael leadership candidates. specifically enda kenny babbling waffle when he was asked about his economic policies. The look on his face was like a kid doing the leaving cert just realising he had studied the wrong paper. And that will explain why I could NEVER vote for FG
Don’t we see enough of Gay Byrne? Young people leaving by the thousand and he has so many income streams it is immoral. Just because his greed got him into trouble financially RTE and The government bail him out. Just like the developers he gets helped out by the taxpayer all because he gambled. He is a greedy guts with a smirk on his face because he can get away with this appalling behaviour. I bet he goes to mass on Sunday’s as well as he is typical of our politicians,developers,and bankers – all smug immoral cheats. I think Gay would let his kids emigrate instead of giving one of them just one of his jobs. RTE equal opportunities employer my xxxx
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