‘Maverick’ Mattie passes doorstep challenge in Tipp

“I TOLD Mattie six months ago that if he was going to stay in Fianna Fáil, I wouldn’t be voting for him.”

Lifelong Fianna Fáil supporter Eileen Bell gets to the root of the task facing her former party of choice as she speaks to newly independent TD Mattie McGrath on a canvas of the streets of Clonmel.

Until a few weeks ago, Mattie was a lifelong Fianna Fáil supporter himself.

Elected to the Dáil at the first attempt in 2007 under the soldiers of destiny banner, the man sometimes referred to as “colourful,” usually as “outspoken,” refused to toe the party line at times and finally lost the parliamentary party whip last summer when he voted against the Government’s ban on stag hunting.

On the cusp of this election campaign, he resigned altogether from the organisation and now stands as an independent in Tipperary South, hopeful of retaining his seat. But according to the latest opinion poll, he faces a battle with Phil Prendergast for the last seat in the three-seater.

“We were always Fianna Fáil supporters, but I think people are hearing it on the doorsteps, that a lot of people have defected,” says Eileen Bell from New Inn. “I have a son on disability and he’s been cut about €16 in the last two years. I have a daughter who is a garda and she’s been cut about €80 a week.”

Further down O’Connell Street, Clonmel, Mattie meets another likely supporter: “Can you look after me?”

“I can of course,” says the woman who prefers not to give her name.

“How many votes are at home?”

“My husband can’t vote here, so you’ll only have six votes then in my house.”

“Are they all working?”

“They are, thank God. I hope you do well Mattie, it’s a big field this time.”

He later greets George McGrath (no relation), owner of a fishing and hunting equipment shop, in Irish, before George explains why the “maverick” TD will have his support next week.

“I said to Mattie... when the Greens were trying to ban the hunt in county Meath, that if he voted against that proposal, I would give him the number one. He stood with the sporting community and the country pursuits we’re pursuing for years and if the Greens had their way, the whole lot would be gone.”

It’s a theme close to the candidate’s heart. “The amount of business associated with coursing or hunting or fishing is huge,” he says himself.

Walking along Clonmel’s main thoroughfare, the former Fianna Fáiler approaches many but is in turn approached by many more who are eager to assure him of their support on the 25th.

“Mattie,” Catriona Ryan says after walking out of her way to meet him, “I just wanted to say thanks to you for getting back to me on the minimum wage.”

A qualified Special Needs Assistant (SNA) and childcare worker, she is out of work since last August but called Mattie McGrath when mutterings first emerged from Government Buildings about a cut in the minimum wage. “I rang him and said, ‘I hope you’re not going to support that’. He rang me back and said he was going to vote against the minimum wage cut. There’s no incentive to work now.”

Getting people back to work is another of Mattie’s hobby-horses, something he always mentions when he’s spreading his “message of hope,” as he puts it himself.

Other times, few words are needed.

“Well Mattie,” says an elderly lady after giving him a big kiss.

Mattie: “You won’t forget me?”

Lady: “Don’t worry.” Enough said.

Over tea and barm-brack in Hickey’s Bakery in Irishtown, Mattie tells fourth-generation baker Nuala Hickey where Brian Lenihan and the government went wrong in the IMF negotiations.

“I ‘phoned him when he came back and asked him, ‘who had you with you’. He said Patrick Honohan and two senior officials. I told Brian Lenihan, he and his officials never bought or sold a banbh [piglet] at a fair. They should have had people there like Eddie Hickey [Nuala’s father] and people like that. They know the value of a shilling, because they earned it.”

There are still times the clearly still popular ex-Fianna Fáiler gets a knock-back on the doorsteps. “I’ve certainly been told — Fianna Fáil, don’t come in.”

Most people are more positive than that. Like Nuala Hickey, who assures him: “If I said no, my father would kill me!”