Bacik wants to create a 'united and re-energised' Labour

Labour's Ivana Bacik:  Labour values are needed front and centre. Picture: Brian Lawless

Ivana Bacik has confirmed her intention to run for the leadership of Labour saying she wants to create a united and re-energised party.

In a email sent to members yesterday morning, Ms Bacik said she now intends to meet councillors and party organisers to hear their ideas around how the Labour Party "can again become the leading centre-left force in Irish politics.”

The email follows Alan Kelly's announcement that he would be stepping down as leader. Mr Kelly made his announcement after he was approached by members of his own parliamentary party who told him they no longer had confidence in him as leader.

Ms Bacik said a collective decision was taken by TDs and senators, and that "there were a combination of factors that led to Alan taking the decision, but certainly things moved very fast".

The latest opinion poll puts the Labour Party on 3% support and she said members of the parliamentary party were concerned about the stagnation in public polls and internal polling which was recently carried out.

However, she added: "There were quite a number of factors, a combination of issues that led to Alan taking the decision."

Speaking on RTÉ radio, Ms Bacik paid tribute to the departing leader, thanking for his "immense commitment to the party in particular, over the last two years" which she said had been difficult during Covid.

On Friday, Mr Kelly backed Ms Bacik and told Tipp FM she would almost certainly become the leader and that he hoped the party would coalesce around her.

Asked about Labour's time in government between 2011 and 2016, from which it has failed to recover from, Ms Bacik said: "I suppose we shouldn't forget that that was also the government that brought Ireland back from the brink of financial ruin of bankruptcy. And indeed, we shouldn't forget that Labour have now been out of that government for longer than we were in it."

She said it is important now that the party goes forward in a united fashion.

"Now, more than ever we need Labour values front and centre, we need that centre left constructive voice for change to come through," she said.

In the letter sent to Labour members yesterday morning, Ms Bacik said social and economic equality had been key priorities in her political life to date.

“These are the socialist and social democratic values that have been at the centres of my political life, from the days when I began campaigning for a woman’s right to choose as a student in Trinity College, to last week when I was proud to chair the first public meeting of the Oireachtas committee on gender equality.”