FF history lesson for Rabbitte

IT was disappointing recently to hear Pat Rabbitte on Morning Ireland flippantly dismiss the Taoiseach’s description of the roots and philosophy of Fianna Fáil as “a republican social party”.

The derisory tone adopted by the leader of the Labour Party serves only to highlight his own ignorance of Irish history.

People with even a cursory knowledge of our history know that Pearse and Connolly, as leaders of the republican and labour movements, fought side by side in 1916 to proclaim a republic in which the egalitarian ideal was one of the central objectives.