Former minister John Perry in High Court bid to be put on Fine Gael ticket

Fine Gael will today face claims in the High Court that party headquarters has acted unfairly in blocking former minister John Perry from defending his Dáil seat.

The Sligo-Leitrim TD will make a last-ditch attempt to overturn an election selection convention result which has barred him from being put on the party ticket. He says a “technical error” at the party’s election selection convention recently has prevented him running.

He was beaten in the election selection process by just a handful of votes, but says some of his supporters were prevented on the night from voting for him.

The former junior jobs minister met his legal team last night, but warned that he wanted to set a precedent in taking a legal injunction against his own party.

In a last throw of the dice, Mr Perry wants to force the party to put him on the ticket alongside party contenders TD Tony McGloughlin and former TD Gerry Reynolds, who were chosen instead to run in Sligo-Leitrim.

Speaking to the Irish Examiner, he said: “We’re launching our interlocutory injunction tomorrow morning at the High Court. This is about the parliamentary party, it is about respect for the membership. We’ve a massive cohort [of members] and they were denied their franchise over a technical error. These are members who paid €15 and were in the party for 30 years, some of them in their 80s.

“An appeals process must be properly adjudicated on in HQ. I’ve been here for 19 years. This is about the precedent that the party HQ can now determine by the colour of their eyes who should be a candidate. I think it is very unfair.”

Fine Gael said it stood by the result of the selection convention.

Meanwhile, Fine Gael leader and Taoiseach Enda Kenny faced questions in the Dáil yesterday about Cavan-Monaghan TD Seán Conlan, who this week quit the party.

Mr Conlan, now expected to run as an independent, had been arrested in September over an alleged assault in his family pub.

Mr Conlan did not return queries last night. However, his position was raised in the Dáil after it emerged through the media he was to be charged. Clare TD Michael McNamara said it was important that people, who opposed the Government, did not learn of charges against them in the media.

Direct links between the Government and gardaí were “discrediting” the force, he warned.

“There is a perception of political policing,” he told Taoiseach Enda Kenny.

Justice Minister Frances Fitzgerald responded that his claim was “nonsense”.