Aontú has decided not to table a motion of no confidence in the Government next week and will instead use its Dáil time to push for reforms related to presidential elections.
On Tuesday the party’s leader Peadar Tóibín had signalled his intention to table a motion of no confidence in Tánaiste Simon Harris next week over controversies in Children’s Health Ireland and waiting times for scoliosis surgery.
However, the Government put forward a motion of confidence in Mr Harris on Wednesday in an apparent bid to defuse the risk of a debate on disabilities during the final week of presidential campaigning.
Mr Tóibín had proposed the motion over Mr Harris’s “failed promise” in 2017 that no child would have to wait more than four months for scoliosis surgery, in the wake of the death of nine-year-old Harvey Morrison Sherratt.
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Harvey died on July 29th following a sudden deterioration in his health. The nine-year-old had waited several years for spinal surgery.
During the confidence motion debate in the Dáil, Taoiseach Micheál Martin paid tribute to Harvey’s parents and said the Government had to do better.
Mr Harris told the Dáil: “I have never claimed to be infallible, but I do act in good faith. And when I make mistakes and when I err, I acknowledge them.”
Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald told him “I have no confidence in you. The families you have let down have no confidence in you.”
The motion of confidence in Mr Harris was passed by 94 votes to 65.
Mr Tóibín said afterwards his party would consider whether or not to bring a motion of no confidence in the Government next week.
He confirmed on Friday that Aontú would not be doing this.
Mr Tóibín said: “We announced the original motion in order to bring as much pressure as possible on the Government to do the right thing for children with scoliosis. We believe we succeeded in achieving this, this week.”
He added: “If we brought a motion of no confidence against the Government next week, we would not be able to table another such motion for another six months.
“This would rob us of a key tool to pressure the Government at a key juncture in the future.”
He said such motions should be used “sparingly” and “be timed to have maximum affect to achieve objectives” and added: “Running two, one week after another would not achieve that objective.”
He said if the Government does not agree to calls from affected families for statutory powers for an inquiry into spina bifida and scoliosis care at CHI to compel people and papers; and to reform the CHI organisation, Aontú will table a motion of no confidence in the Government within six months.
Mr Tóibín said the party will use its private members time next week to table a motion seeking reform of the presidential election nomination process; to give presidential election voting rights to Irish citizens in Northern Ireland; and to make the office of president more transparent.
Aontú had spearheaded efforts to get conservative campaigner Maria Steen on the presidential election ballot paper through Oireachtas nominations.
In the end, Ms Steen was unsuccessful in her bid to enter the race securing 18 of the 20 Oireachtas nominations she needed. The other route to entering the election is to win the backing of four county or city councils.
Aontú’s motion includes a call for the Government to hold referendum within the next three years seeking to amend the Constitution to allow a presidential candidate to be nominated by 14 Oireachtas members or more, or 110 county and city councillors or more, or three county or city councils, or an incumbent president.
Meanwhile, Stormont’s deputy First Minister told a press conference following the North South Ministerial Council in Dublin that extending voting rights in Irish presidential elections to citizens living in Northern Ireland would be overstepping the mark.
The DUP’s Emma Little-Pengelly said the difference between political reality and political aspiration had to be recognised, as she stressed that Northern Ireland’s head of state is the King.
Sinn Féin First Minister Michelle O’Neill said it is a “huge democratic deficit” that she, as an Irish citizen, could run to be president of Ireland but yet could not vote in the elections, as she lives north of the border.
-Additional reporting: PA
