Harris gets a frosty reception from Enda as the fog swirls in Tullamore
Taoiseach Simon Harris out canvassing with fellow Fine Gael candidate councillor John Clendennen in Tullamore, Offaly. Picture: Fergal Phillips
A thick fog had descended upon Tullamore on Tuesday afternoon by the time Fine Gael leader Simon Harris landed into the town, with canvassers eagerly awaiting his arrival.
He spun through the town at a blistering pace, after earlier being put through his paces by farmers at an Irish Farmers Association hustings in Bluebell, Dublin.
There were plenty of bemused onlookers, smartphones at the ready as the Taoiseach, with a gaggle of cameras, press and Fine Gael staff, walked up the town.
He doubled down on his mantra of new energy, telling Fine Gael candidate John Clendennen he had visited 17 separate constituencies in the one day.
As a bemused crowd looked on and laughed, Harris quickly caught himself and said: “Sorry, 17 constituencies since the Dáil was dissolved [on Friday].” “I didn’t believe I’d done 17,” he added.
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First stop was into the Bridge Shopping Centre, where he was mobbed by shoppers before being ushered into a local barbers — chairs packed with patrons having their mops chopped.
One young man, mid-haircut, spotted Harris and quickly pulled out his phone for a video, declaring: “We’re here with all the boys” Harris took his cue, repeating: “We’re here with all the boys, hanging out in the barbers.” Asked if he was up for a haircut, he replied that he probably needed one but that he “can’t get the gray out of it anymore”.
One passerby stopped Harris to raise a petition from a woman named Muriel on providing a safety net for cancer patients who miss work due to requiring treatment.
“At the minute, if she’s going to get any treatment or appointments, she’s to miss out on days. She doesn’t get paid,” she raised.
She asked Harris to examine a system to support cancer patients who miss out on work, with the Taoiseach responding that it was a “really good idea”.
Asked by reporters afterwards if it would be something he would consider as a future policy, Mr Harris responded: “Yes, I think it’s a sensible idea, but I just want to understand more about it”.
But as he wandered his way up Columcille Street and was about to make his way into the Chocolate Brown cafe, he spotted one man — Enda — sitting alone enjoying a coffee.
While Harris extended his hand and came close for a chat, the man took a look and repeated the word “don’t”, in what was a fairly rare rejection of the Taoiseach in the town.
Harris quickly responded back with a “sorry, I won’t” and wandered off into the café.
Enda said he is not just displeased with Fine Gael, but that he took issue with the entire government including Fianna Fáil and the Greens.
He highlighted projects like the Children’s Hospital and runaway public spending as issues for him, while calling for anyone else to go into government, adding:
He took umbrage with the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael for their “anti-Sinn Féin policies” and highlighted the fact that the two parties have been in and out of power since the State was founded.
“So, better the devil you know doesn’t cut it anymore. Why not change,” he asked.
Final stop on the trail for the day was in Clendennen’s new local offices, where the councillor has set himself up for managing his campaign.
Harris, not a man to miss any sort of opening, had the honour of cutting the ribbon to the new office, where he called for Fine Gael not to “leave anything in the dressing room” on the runup to polling day.
“Don’t stand in the count centre and say ‘if only we had done that or if only we had dropped a few more leaflets or if only we had knocked on a few more doors’.” With 17 days left until polling day, Harris himself will have plenty of doors to knock and leaflets to drop in what will be a nail biter for all involved.
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