Sending the wrong message

ON Nov 10, the Fine Gael-Labour Coalition will ask the public to approve a referendum to insert dedicated children’s rights into the Constitution.

The goal of the referendum, according to Children’s Minister Frances Fitzgerald, is to protect children by putting their safety and welfare at the centre of decision-making.

As it seeks to pass the referendum, the Coalition will be endeavouring to demonstrate its commitment to ensuring that all children are treated equally.

Phil Hogan’s letter to constituents concerning the allocation of a local authority house seems utterly incongruous with that message.

The letter was to inform constituents in Bonnettstown, Co Kilkenny, that a Traveller family would not be given a house in the townland.

“Just a note to let you know that the McCarthy [sic] family will not be allocated a house in your area,” he wrote.

“Councillor Billy Ireland and I are glad to be of assistance in this matter.”

In other words: That family about whom you voiced concern will not be housed in your area. My political colleague and I have seen to that.

The family in question are the Carthys — Patrick, his wife Brigid, and their seven children. The youngest of those children are one-year-old twins, one of whom requires a feeding tube, Mr Carthy told local radio station KCLR yesterday.

The family got the house in the end. Prior to this they had been living on a halting site.

Did Phil Hogan take any of this into account when making representations to the local council? It would seem not. From his point of view, as he related to KCLR presenter Sue Nunn yesterday, the issue was simple.

The Carthys had a connection with the area. Many years ago, when Patrick Carthy was a youngster, he lived in a nearby house. The family had been involved in antisocial behaviour at the time, Hogan insisted.

“There is history between this particular family in the past and I’m surprised that Patrick wasn’t able to remember it,” he said.

“The local authority asked the family to leave some years ago when he was growing up there with his father and his mother and his extended family. Like, I didn’t make that decision and I didn’t make any decision in relation to recent events in terms of the allocation of the house — it’s the local authority that makes that decision.”

Hogan happily admitted that when locals had raised this historical antisocial behaviour with him earlier this year upon learning of the possibility that Patrick Carthy would be allocated the house, he passed the information on to the local authority.

“The neighbours in that area brought to my attention information which I supplied to the council last May. They decided that because of that information that they wouldn’t proceed with the allocation of the house to Patrick and his wife and his family, and that they would get alternative accommodation elsewhere for them. But subsequently they reviewed the situation and went ahead with the allocation of the house with conditions attached.”

Hogan was trying to have the best of both worlds — stressing he did not make the decision, which is correct, but also hinting that his actions had influenced the council, at least initially.

His subsequent letter to constituents — based on his then understanding that the family would not get the house — was, in political terms, both a declaration that a favour had been done and a request to be remembered in future. A politician who tells constituents he is “glad to be of assistance” generally expects the favour to be returned with votes.

It seems Hogan took just one side of the story and forgot that the Carthys were constituents of his, too. He didn’t appear to give Patrick Carthy any kind of second chance in relation to the antisocial behaviour Hogan says his family carried out in the 1990s. And he didn’t seem to give Patrick Carthy’s children much consideration either.

Hogan argued yesterday that he had spent his career trying to get people properly housed, and that he was perfectly entitled to make representations on behalf of his constituents.

But as local Green Cllr Malcolm Noonan pointed out, there’s a huge difference between trying to get people housed and trying to prevent people from being housed.

Noonan also made another relevant point — that Fine Gael had promised to be a reforming government and end this kind of clientelist approach to politics.

“That’s why the Green Party were wiped out in the last election, because of this preciousness that you’re going on with,” Hogan sneered.

Such is our “reforming” government.