Immigration question could dictate Jim O’Callaghan’s future

Good morning,

“I’m not a prophet,” Jim O’Callaghan told journalists at the British-Irish intergovernmental conference meeting in Farmleigh on Monday. The Minister for Justice was responding to questions on the future leadership of Fianna Fáil, as speculation continues to rumble on about Micheál Martin.

“I think the Taoiseach is doing a very good job. I think some people forget that he led us very successfully in the general election that took place less than a year ago,” he said. “In respect of your questions about the future, my response would be, I’m not a prophet.”

O’Callaghan is not claiming to be the messiah, nor to have any particular powers of prophecy, but he wouldn’t need supernatural foresight to know two things: firstly, that questions about the crossover between his own ambitions and his boss’s future aren’t going away. Secondly, how he handles immigration policy will be a key factor in the extended audition under way to replace Martin as Fianna Fáil leader when the time comes.

Who is Paschal Donohoe? Profile of Minister for Finance stepping down for role at World Bank

Paschal Donohoe’s resignation leaves Government substantially weaker with problems piling up

Paschal Donohoe to resign from Government and take up position at World Bank

Migration politics went off the boil a little just before the general election a year ago, but it remains one of the thorniest areas of policy for the coalition.

Yesterday’s news that the UK is planning a range of sweeping reforms to its own asylum policies is a timely reminder that migration is ultimately influenced by a range of factors outside Irish control.

Dublin is already moving ahead with a general tightening of conditions – with the latest potential measures discussed on Monday evening by coalition leaders alongside O’Callaghan.

There is probably no other element of O’Callaghan’s brief that will attract as much attention in the coming months. That is both an opportunity and a risk for the Dublin Bay South TD.

Elsewhere, the Opposition signalled its intention to turn the screw on the Government over the slow progress of the Occupied Territories Bill – and the inclusion of measures banning trade in services as well as in goods originating in illegally occupied parts of Palestine.

Amid charges of heel-dragging, the leaders of the combined Opposition parties (fresh from Catherine Connolly’s victory in the presidential election) put on a show of strength on Monday, holding a joint press conference at Leinster House.

The Government will not oppose an Opposition motion on Wednesday urging the immediate presentation of the Bill – but there’s still a lot we don’t know about what comes next with this legislation. More on that here.

Meanwhile, Mary Lou McDonald of Sinn Féin continues to face unwelcome questions over how people in her party ended up “in proximity” to a man arrested as part of an investigation into an alleged plot by an extreme far-right group to attack a Galway mosque.

Best reads

Former Green Party leader Eamon Ryan writes from the Cop30 negotiations in Belém, Brazil.

Fintan O’Toole on Donald Trump and the vampiric Jeffrey Epstein.

Our lead story today reveals a massive €23 million writedown in the property holdings of the beleaguered Peter McVerry Trust.

The trust’s chair, former HSE boss, Tony O’Brien, will be in at the Public Accounts Committee on Thursday.

Can you qualify for affordable housing on a six-figure salary? Yes, says Fiona Reddan.

Hugh Linehan on turmoil at the BBC.

Playbook

The political day is kick-started by the Cabinet, which meets in Government Buildings at about 9am. Here’s what’s on the agenda.

Meanwhile, parliamentary action begins at 2pm in the Dáil with Leaders’ Questions, before Taoiseach’s Questions and Government Business (given over to statements on Ukraine) in the afternoon. Sinn Féin has a motion on the Mercosur Trade Agreement in the evening, before Minister for Transport Darragh O’Brien takes oral questions later on. The day finishes with topical issues, scheduled to run until just before midnight.

The full schedule is here.

They’re under way in the Seanad at 2.30pm, with Government business given over to legislation increasing borrowing limits and other financial matters at the ESB, as well as defamation reform laws in the evening.

Here’s the full schedule.

In the committee rooms, the Good Friday Agreement Committee is hearing about all-island cancer research at 11am, while at the same time, the AI committee is hearing about the impact of that technology on “truth and democracy”, if you don’t mind.

In the afternoon, the housing committee meets to discuss supplying excess renewable energy to homes in energy poverty – that’s at 3pm.

Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan is taking supplementary estimates through the Justice Committee, while the budgetary oversight committee is continuing post-budget engagement. The Foreign Affairs committee is hearing all about the bilateral relationship with Canada. They all run from 3pm.

In the evening, Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary is bringing through legislation on auto-enrolment at the relevant committee, while pre-legislative scrutiny of rent pressure zone legislation and laws governing apartment remediation takes place at the housing committee. The schedule is here.