CEANN COMHAIRLE Séamus Kirk was forced to exercise his casting vote to save the Government from an embarrassing defeat in a debate to move the writ for the Donegal South West byelection.
The Dáil had divided 76:76 when Fianna Fáil TDs Frank Fahey (Galway West) and Timmy Dooley (Clare) voted in error with the Opposition following the Sinn Féin motion demanding the seat, vacant for 11 months, be filled.
The vacancy arose after Pat “The Cope” Gallagher was elected to the European parliament in June last year.
Government chief whip John Curran defended the refusal to hold the byelection on the grounds that it would distract from the economy.
He said, “We do not believe that now it would be in the best interests of the people of Ireland, or for the people of Donegal, that the Government and political parties take their eyes off the recovery of the economy to focus our attention on the running of electoral contests”.
Sinn Féin Dáil leader Caoimhghin Ó Caoláin said there should be a “constitutional obligation for a byelection to be held in a set period after the vacancy occurs” and not on the basis of what was “politically expedient”.
Earlier Taoiseach Brian Cowen rejected a demand by Labour leader Eamon Gilmore that he set a date for byelections to fill the three empty seats including Dublin South, which was vacant since the resignation of George Lee, and the Waterford seat, unfilled since the resignation of Martin Cullen two months ago on health grounds.
Mr Gilmore claimed that the Taoiseach did not have the “bottle” to call a general election and that every time he was asked about the byelections he had a way of “dodging” it, because he was “running scared of the people”.
He told Mr Cowen: “You’re making it sound as though the right of people to be represented in Dáil Éireann is some kind of a form of political patronage that can be doled out by Fianna Fáil and that a byelection can be handed out like a national lottery.”
Mr Gilmore accused Mr Cowen of finding “every reason under the sun to give us a vague answer” about the date of an election for the Dublin mayor, or for the referendum on children’s rights, in case he is “pinned down” about the byelections.
But Mr Cowen rejected his claim of political patronage, saying he was elected on the same basis as Mr Gilmore and added that the byelection was a “matter for the House” and not for Government.
Introducing the Dáil motion for the Donegal South West byelection, Mr Ó Caoláin said the Government’s refusal to hold the byelection was “politically not surprising” but “democratically unacceptable”.
The system was flawed when a Government “can obstruct the process of calling a byelection for selfish political purposes”.
