Green Party TD Neasa Hourigan has applied to be readmitted to its parliamentary party, 15 months after losing the whip for voting against a Government motion on the eviction ban.
Ms Hourigan was suspended from the parliamentary party in March 2023 and also lost her position as chair of the Oireachtas Budgetary Oversight committee. Her application coincides with the 15-month period of suspension coming to an end.
The Dublin Central TD abstained in two Dáil votes in March last year that arose out of a Sinn Féin motion calling for the eviction ban to be extended into 2024. She also voted against the Government’s countermotion.
She confirmed on Tuesday that she has emailed an application to be readmitted to the party.
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“It is for the parliamentary party to decide to accept it. I believe the next meeting is on Wednesday.”
Ms Hourigan is one of two candidates, along with Senator Róisín Garvey, for the position of deputy leader of the party which is being vacated by Catherine Martin.
A third candidate, Ossian Smyth, announced on Monday that he was withdrawing from the race. The two candidates will be involved in hustings this week in advance of the online vote of the party’s 3,425 members.
At the time of her suspenion, Ms Hourigan was highly critical of the decision and expressed disappointment that then party leader, Eamon Ryan, did not “speak up for Green Party values and Green Party policy”.
It was the third time Ms Hourigan had been sanctioned by the party for not obeying the whip.
She was suspended for six months in 2022 along with fellow Green TD Patrick Costello after they voted against the Government in a Sinn Féin Dáil motion on the new National Maternity Hospital (NMH) in May.
In 2020, soon after the formation of the Government, Ms Hourigan had her Dáil speaking rights removed for two months along with Minister of State Joe O’Brien after they failed to vote with the Government on a tenant’s rights Bill.
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