Fianna Fáil by-election candidate says landlady blog was 'lighthearted'

Deirdre Conroy wrote the blog ‘Diary of Dublin Landlady’ in which she complained about some of her tenants. Picture: Maxwells 

Fianna Fáil's candidate for the Dublin Bay South by-election insists a blog she wrote about her experience of having a Latvian man as a tenant was "lighthearted".

Deirdre Conroy, a councillor for Kimmage-Rathmines since 2019, wrote the blog ‘Diary of Dublin Landlady’ from 2013 to 2014.

In it, she complained that some of her tenants wanted to turn the heating on at night, have guests over, and, after one poor experience with a Latvian national, she complained about the smell of his cooking.

The short-term tenant, with whom she had a strained relationship in February 2013, and she nicknamed Dr Kovac after a character in the TV series ER, led her to say it is “better to stick with what you know if you have to share your house”.

After he moved out, she wrote of discovering a child benefit application form he had filled out: "It will take the property tax of six houses in this cul-de-sac to meet the annual child benefit to one five-year-old in Latvia."

'Linen cupboard'

Ms Conroy also suggested renting out her “linen cupboard”.

When asked about the blog, Ms Conroy, an architectural conservation specialist and qualified barrister, said that in 2013 she had “needed to rent out a room in my house because of the severe financial constraints” she had been under.

“I had a large mortgage and a family to look after on my own. I was also trying at that time to get some work in journalism and therefore started a blog,” she said 

She said the diary had been written “in a light-hearted manner” and the passage referring to her linen cupboard was a “light-hearted reference to the spare room”. 

On her experience with the Latvian tenant, she said she was “not in any way trying to suggest that people from Latvia were bad tenants”.

“I had one bad experience with a tenant who happened to be from Latvia,” she said, adding she is a "very inclusive person" committed to ensuring everyone is treated equally.

“Anyone who knows me will know that I am a very inclusive person who is committed to ensuring that everyone, irrespective of their background, is treated equally,” she said, adding that she no longer rents her spare room.

Elsewhere in the blog, Ms Conroy opined that the Dáil needs “more so-called elite”.

“Professionally qualified practitioners, industrialists, thinkers and do-ers and less school teachers on long term leave,” she wrote.