Lucinda Creighton to run as Reform candidate

Rebel ex-minister Lucinda Creighton has said for the first time that she expects to fight the next election under the Reform Alliance banner.

While claiming the breakaway grouping’s debut conference in the RDS today is not the launch pad for a new party, the former Europe minister’s comments are set to enflame suspicion among former Fine Gael colleagues about her ultimate ambitions.

Asked if she would campaign to hold her Dublin seat at the next general election as a Reform Alliance candidate, Ms Creighton said: “I think that’s quite likely, I don’t know if it will be anything more than a banner, but that’s how we have been working together.”

Ms Creighton, who was expelled from the Fine Gael parliamentary party after voting against X Case legislation, has become increasingly estranged from the party leadership.

The ex-minister recently hit out at former colleagues for telling her that if she behaved like “a good child” and kept her head down she could be re-admitted to Fine Gael at some time in the future.

With speculation at Leinster House rife that the Reform Alliance has the potential to crystalise into a fully fledged centre-right party, Ms Creighton said she hoped the conference would be a forum for new ideas, rather than the starting point for a rival to Fine Gael.

The Reform Alliance, which is made up of five former Fine Gael TDs and two senators, has registered with the Standards in Public Office Commission as a “third party” in a bid to allow it to raise funding, but the move does not establish it as a distinct political organisation.

The move is at odds with declarations from leading Reform Alliance figures that the grouping was only interested in gaining extra speaking rights in the Dáil when it was formed last autumn.

Attendees registered for the conference via the Reform Alliance’s website and organisers are holding the event in a 500-person capacity section of the RDS centre.

The event will cover the areas of political reform, health policy and the economy, with guest speakers such as the broadcaster Olivia O’Leary, and the economist David McWilliams.

Independent TD Mattie McGrath says he is “open to persuasion” about joining the breakaway Reform Alliance.

Former Fianna Fáiler, now Tipperary Independent deputy, Mr McGrath, is attending the one-day meeting, but says he has not decided to join the Dáil grouping.