Councillor on honeymoon standby for mayoral vote plot

A Fianna Fáil councillor was on call to come back from his honeymoon after a plot was hatched to prevent Fine Gael retaining the office of mayor of County Cork.

A number of independent councillors decided to try and oust FG from the top seat and earlier in the week had won backing from FF. They also had SF on board, but still had to rely on Labour councillors yesterday to get a majority.

Phone calls were made late last Friday to woo Labour members, but they fell on deaf ears, so Cllr Seamus McGrath (FF) was able to carry on with his honeymoon.

And it was just as well for Cllr Noel O’Connor, the FG mayoral nominee, who had arrived at County Hall with his whole family, plus pre-rehearsed acceptance speech for the assembled media.

Little did he know then how close he’d come to being seriously embarrassed.

It had been mooted by some independents that they might nominate Cllr Martin Coughlan (Lab) for the chain of office, but in the event this didn’t happen.

Some Labour councillors said after the meeting that if they had done this, Labour would have had no choice but to pull its support for the FG candidate.

FF would also have supported Mr Coughlan, and with Mr McGrath hot-footing it from the airport, the Labour man would have won the day.

FF leader on the council, Alan Coleman, was scathing of Labour’s support for Mr O’Connor. He said it showed Labour had the same “lack of ambition on the council as they had in government,” and described the party as “the Fine Gael mudguard”.

Mr Coleman said he had listened to Labour councillors whinging for the past four years about getting crumbs from the FG table, adding they’d “spurned an opportunity” to have the mayorship themselves.

Labour’s Noel McCarthy replied that his party was “honourable” and made a pact last year to support FG in the vote.

In return for this, Mr Coughlan was elected to the post of deputy mayor.