Two Fianna Fáil TDs have called for the government to abandon its Hate Speech law, after Friday’s referenda were resoundingly defeated.
Fianna Fáil TDs Wille O’Dea and John McGuinness have both broken ranks with their party leadership over its support of proposed hate speech legislation.
It follows reports that Finance Minister, Fianna Fáil’s Michael McGrath, has indicated that the government is set to proceed with its hate crime legislation, despite calls for it to be paused.
RTE’s Political Correspondent Paul Cunningham reported on Monday that Minister McGrath said:”Government has made commitments… We shouldn’t ignore the reality that there is a problem in parts of society, particularly on social media, and we don’t want to be a country that is tolerant of people inciting hate.”
He said: "Government has made commitments… We shouldn't ignore the reality that there is a problem in parts of society, particularly on social media, and we don't want to be a country that is tolerant of people inciting hate ."
— Paul Cunningham (@RTENewsPaulC) March 11, 2024
Limerick TD O’Dea took to Twitter on Monday, telling his party to “stop playing to the woke gallery,” explicitly mentioning the hate speech bill.
“Focus on housing, health, and law & order, and stop playing to the woke gallery. Start listening to the people, stop talking down to them and stop listening to the out of touch Greens & NGOs #Referendum2024,” Mr O’Dea posted on x, formerly Twitter.
Fianna Fáil needs to get back to basics & abandon the Hate Speech Bill etc. Focus on Housing, Health and Law & Order and stop playing to the woke gallery. Start listening to the people, stop talking down to them and stop listening to the out of touch Greens & NGOs #Referendum2024
— Willie O'Dea (@willieodeaLIVE) March 11, 2024
Fianna Fail TD John McGuinness later appeared on Newstalk’s The Hard Shoulder programme on Monday, saying he agreed that the Hate Speech law should be abandoned.
Asked if he agreed with Deputy O’Dea’s sentiment, and if it was time to abandon the Hate Speech Bill, and focus on things like housing, healthcare, and law and order, Deputy McGuinness responded:
“Yeah, it is,” he said. “And this has been said before at parliamentary party meetings. So it’s not as if it’s not being said, or as if it’s being said arising from the referendum. What’s happening here is that the leadership of government and the parliamentary parties are tone-deaf to the issues that they are hearing being raised in the Dail chamber and at parliamentary party meetings.
During the interview, he told host Kieran Kuddihy he had voted No/No on Friday. Prior to the vote, Deputy McGuinness spoke to Gript about his reasons for voting no, saying he had been convinced by the arguments made by former Attorney General, Senator Michael McDowell.
In an exclusive interview with Gript, Fianna Fáil TD John McGuinness says Senator Michael McDowell's arguments convinced him to vote ‘No’ in the upcoming referendums, and that State-funded campaigning NGOs were at risk of skewing the result.https://t.co/hzYdZtdjUO
— gript (@griptmedia) February 27, 2024
“I made it perfectly clear before polling day that that’s what I was doing,” he said, adding: “I voted no because I didn’t see any reason for having the referendum. They were poorly explained. There was no discussion; there was a guillotine in relation to pre-legislative scrutiny in the context of the Dail and committee work.”
“The leadership, then, was given by Michael McDowell – and he gave clear, concise reasons why the people should vote no. And i was touched by those various interviews that he did, and I was happy to support the No campaign.”
Asked whether he was swayed by arguments made by TDs in his own party, the Kilkenny TD said:
“They didn’t make any argument, that’s the point. They put the wording before the citizens for their view on it; for them to vote on it. But they didn’t spell out why they were doing this. For example, in relation to taking women or the mother out of the Constitution, they never explained the consequences of that; of their actions.
‘HUGE DAMAGE IN TERMS OF GOVERNMENT TRUST’
“They put in the word in the Care [referendum] about strive. Well, there’s no need to strive – just wait until Budget Day and give carers the recognition they deserve. This was a complete cock-up by government, and each of the parties are to blame for this.
“There was no need to spend €20 million in a referendum, quite frankly. And I think they’ve done huge damage in terms of government trust, and so on. But they’ve exposed themselves as well, as to how far they will go, in their arrogance, to get what they want.”
Asked that if he was talking about the government’s collective arrogance, that would mean “quite a few” Fianna Fail TDs, Mr McGuiness agreed, stating, “Sure I know that. And Greens, and Fine Gael, and their TDs and their members of the Cabinet.”
“And they did not tease out the referendum wording to the extent that they knew the answer to every single matter that was raised. They couldn’t give the answers. And I was very disturbed that even at the count, there was no great presence of anyone there – with the exception of Leo Varadkar and Eamon Ryan.
“There should have been a government response to that. That tells me from the beginning that they were just throwing this together in the hope that the people would respond – and that didn’t happen for them,” he said.
“And as a result of that, they now have to revisit that trust, and they have to start doing business differently, reflecting on the needs of society and the individuals within society – and put people first, rather than their own grand notions.”
‘IT’S TOO LATE COMING OUT AFTERWARDS, AND SAYING, ‘I VOTED NO'”
Asked about colleague Willie O’Dea’s comments regarding the Hate Speech Bill and the direction of Fianna Fail, McGuinness went on to criticise TDs for “coming out after the event” to say they had voted no, saying it was “too late coming out afterwards, and saying, ‘I voted No’”.
“Of course you could say all of that. But some of my colleagues have come out after the event and said they voted No. But when you’re in a party, and that party is in government, or indeed if it’s in opposition, you come to the parliamentary party meetings, and you express your point of view there. And either try to strengthen your position or try to change the position of government – and that didn’t happen on this occasion.
“So it’s too late coming out afterwards, and saying, ‘Well I voted No.’ So what does it look like now? Government will have to respond to the issues that face people in their own lives. They haven’t been doing that. They haven’t been paying attention.”
“I listen carefully to questions to the Taoiseach and Ministers, and it is the basic things. Access to proper healthcare; access for care of our children for mental health issues and for autism and so on; access to school places; access to buses for school. They’re the basic rights that people should have. And they are not being listened to. They are being ignored – and that is why [the government] got such a resounding response of a No vote on polling day.”
Deputy McGuinness said he believed his party had “damaged itself” because of the fact it went into coalition with Fine Gael, and previous to that, due to confidence and supply, adding, “We need to set out our own policies.”
He admitted that “it’s hard to tell the difference now between any of the parties in government, and the policies of that party.”
“That’s not good for politics,” he added. “It’s not good for democracy.”
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The powerlessness and weakness of party politics on full display. Calling for anything does not cut it anymore. These people have no power in the party. Pointless calling for anything in a globalist echo chamber. If they did not see an end to their own career political trough gouging, they would not be calling for anything. If they truly believed in what they were saying, they would leave the party.
Agreed. Calling for something is just virtue signalling these days. We elect these people to implement effective policy in areas of housing, health care, education, immigration, employment and enterprise, not simply empty calling for something.
They only show how useless and pointless they are which is counter productive to what we expect. Willie is still basking off the glory of fitting a toilet in a council house for someone back in the 90’s for votes.
Hate speech Bill, far more insidious and dangerous than the limp wristed referenda.
This is also oppossed by 75% who took the trouble to respond to a survey carried out by the government and who then quickly ignored its findings.
Haven’t had such bad governance since the 70s. Ruining the country after so much progress.
Back in the 70s, students could rent budget accomodation, bedsits, shared bathroom. You’d get a good one if you looked around but everyone got something, nobody without accomodation. The problem was inflation and high loan interest rates. A student who had a bank loan had very high interest. Many students worked in USA for summer or a European country, if studying their language, or UK. There was deprivation and poverty in areas of Dublin, but no fear or threat, the city centre was a lovely place. Students did not have cars, had less disposable income and often hitch hiked, if travelling a distance. Large stores, no shopping malls in city centre. Rush hour traffic was always bad. You’d have to leave v early in the AM if going through the city centre to work. There was a recession in ’74 and builders were left with built houses on their hands, but it lifted gradually. There was a focus on core issues and the opposition parties provided opposition, unlike now.
Made commitments to who? Brussels….not the Irish people that’s for sure!
And their anti Irish NGO masters .
Mc Entee confirmed that they were introducing the legislation because “people wanted it” aka the NGO’s pushing for it !
Hilarious to see Michael McGrath effectively writing his own dismissal letter for the electorate , I thought he was too cute for that & had more saavy , we hadn’t heard much from him in the last few weeks I thought he was being cute , what a silly boy to make this comment.
I was wondering that too. What commitments ?. Who do they serve ?.
FF only hope is to get rid of freemason Martin and break from government on immigration and hate speech. It is up to Varadkar then if he wants to sack them and precipitate a general election. But FF won’t do that. They will go along with the same old crap. The hate speech bill will be pushed through. All of the political establishment will get another kicking in June. They will stall on untill next February and the best part of them will be gone by next March. It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of cu–s.
At last the penny is beginning to drop. The grey cells are finally realising that TD’s are elected to represent the views of the people who voted them into office. That their priority should be the the Irish people rather than NGO’s, foreign wars, faddish ideologies, carbon zero output, etc.
What commitments did they make and to whom?
Too little too late, should of come out before the election.
As the result showed , most voters knew there was something wrong with the wording. And the wool was being pulled over our eyes.
As for the NGO’s, no NGO has ever solved the “ problem “ they’re there to help. They just get bigger and get more funding . Now they have the ear of the government. Any “Citizens Assembly “ are full of them .
If NGOs solved the problems they are supposed to be dealing with they would make themselves redundant. Instead they always claim that the problem is getting worse and that they need more money from the taxpayer to solve it. The more they fail the more money they get.
If they had the courage of their convictions they would leave their parties and join a party that is opposed to the anti- free speech bill.
This is interesting. I posted two youtube clips of Michael Martin advocating for a new definition of sovereignty in the presence of Varnier in the dail, & Coveney + Peter Sutherland being interviewed at a Bilderberg conference in Denmark but the post was rejected by Gript moderators. I made no personal comment. Why was this deleted?
Willie o’ dea recently twitted Fianna Fáil needs to get back to basics & abandon the Hate Speech Bill etc. Focus on Housing, Health and Law & Order and stop playing to the woke gallery. Start listening to the people, stop talking down to them and stop listening to the out of touch Greens & NGO like drinkaware Ireland and allow Irish people to socialize in peace without having to take out a mortgage to buy a six pack of beers or buy a small a bottle of whiskey to offer friends when they come over ,why o why can the rest of Europe buy alcohol substantially cheaper than we can is it because their politicians treat there populations like sensible adults
R
I might start my own NGO called exercise aware, if you are fat and run you may damage your knees,joints and heart and put unessecary strain on the HSE.Also buying all this run wear and changing shoes is unsustainable and raises your carbon footprint,recycle your asics
Lifting weights and being in good physical shape is offensive to ugly people who strive to be beautiful but know McDonalds is just a short drive away.Stop the hate crime.Stop exercising,drink beer ,respect the man boobs.
We need to make our TDs aware if they go ahead with this hate bill they will lose your vote.
…which may require pretending that they didn’t lose it – forever – in 2020.
Well, as you know, I’ve left you today over you deleting perfectly proper posts with no explanation. You’re doing good work, but just be careful not to become like those you fight against, & treat your subscriptors with respect.
On the back of a resounding rejection of their abilities to make policy and to govern, the globalist owned political class must be really compromised to continue a pace in bringing in hate speech legislation that 75%+ of the electorate do not accept
look at this… we apparently need a new definition of sovereignty…. Micheál Martin rejects a “backward-looking idea of sovereignty” for no sovereignty at all (youtube.com)… also this… Goldman Sachs Peter Sutherland Confronted at Bilderberg (youtube.com)
https://freespeechireland.ie/petition/