Labour TDs vent fury over Taoiseach remarks

FURY among Labour TDs over how Enda Kenny “humiliated” them in the Dáil provoked angry scenes at a tense pre-budget meeting with Eamon Gilmore.

Backbenchers used a gathering of Labour TDs and senators to express anger at the Taoiseach’s remarks, which they took as an attack on their honesty.

Coalition relations plunged to a low after the Taoiseach said, “I will make an honest leader of the Tánaiste, Deputy Gilmore” in response to a question on Labour’s now threatened election pledge to protect child benefit from cuts.

Addressing Mr Gilmore at the party meeting later, one prominent TD said: “I can’t believe you’d let the prime minister of the country stand up in the Dáil and say he is going to make an honest man of you.”

Mr Gilmore was then asked: “Are you going to let this pass?”

Another TD accused the leadership of engaging in “sloppy politics”.

The meeting saw concerns raised over the threat to child benefit and medical cards and resulted in Labour TDs being told to stop talking to the media on the subjects, though Mr Gilmore admitted the party needed a different way of approaching budgets in future, according to sources present.

A Labour TD said after the meeting: “Enda Kenny tried to humiliate us — if this is what is being said on the floor of the parliament, I’d hate to think what is happening in private.”

Fine Gael then opened a second front against their partners as TDs and senators attacked Labour’s commitment to the Croke Park deal, arguing that protecting public sector pay meant bigger cuts for frontline services in the budget.

Cork North Central’s Dara Murphy said: “We are not prepared to see the health budget decimated by virtue of jittery Labour Party ministers.”

The Labour leadership later signalled free medical cards would be protected and health cuts kept to €250 million, not the €500m previously floated.

The bitterness erupted after the Taoiseach’s answer to Socialist TD Joe Higgins’s question asking him to restore “honesty” to Mr Gilmore and his party, in which Mr Kenny said he would “make an honest leader of the Tánaiste”.

The Taoiseach then stated that Labour’s election stance had made a clear reference to “the child care issue”.

“The Tánaiste and I agreed on a Programme for Government subsequently — therefore, the deputy is right, the Labour Party programme was clear prior to the election. There is no denial in that regard. The Tánaiste was completely honest in his pronouncements prior to the election.”

A second, later Labour meeting held to hear from Public Expenditure Minister Brendan Howlin was described by one TD as “a more positive meeting, less reflective of the tension of the last few days than the earlier meeting”.