Mary Lou McDonald has staunchly defended her party’s actions and processes in dealing with the mounting controversies engulfing Sinn Féin, amid trenchant Government criticism of her handling of a child abuse case, and the circumstances surrounding the resignation of a former senator and two TDs.
The Sinn Féin leader said there should be “real consequences for wrongdoing” and that her party’s approach was “guided by the welfare of children” and “governed by robust disciplinary procedures”.
She was speaking during Dáil statements on child protection, initially called for by Government TDs following revelations that former press officer Michael McMonagle who had been suspended when he was being investigated for alleged child abuse offences, subsequently received job references from two senior party officials and got a job with the British Heart Foundation.
Former Laois party TD Brian Stanley resigned last weekend in a growing row with the party over a complaint and counter complaint made over an incident in October last year, the nature of which has not been revealed, and which the party notified the gardaí about only on Sunday.
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Ms McDonald said Mr Stanley’s resignation was “very serious” linked to a complaint against him that left the complainant “traumatised and distressed”. He is responsible for his behaviour and “must account for it”. She had not known the details of the complaint because “no third party is privy to” the party’s investigative process “at all stages”.
The Sinn Féin leader confirmed that former senator Niall Ó Donnghaile is the person who sent inappropriate texts to a 17-year-old member of the party who contacted party authorities because he wanted the texts to stop. And she revealed that a second person also detailed receiving “inappropriate” messages from him.
The party did not name Mr Ó Donnghaile at the time because it could have been dangerous for his mental health and she insisted that he was held to account “as a result of the procedures in our party”.
Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman opened the debate and warned that the issue of child protection should not be used as a “political football” as he focused on the Government’s efforts to address child protection issues.
Fianna Fáil Minister of State Anne Rabbitte roundly condemned Sinn Féin, however, describing its management of the issue as “highly flawed”. Speaking in advance of Ms McDonald she claimed the party’s course of action “appears to be one of delay, dismiss and deflect”.
Addressing Ms McDonald she referred to “your paedophile press officer, your censorship of party members, your kangaroo courts, your Senator inappropriately texting a teenager ... your party members in prison for organised crime”, adding that “I’d urge an abundance of caution in allowing it anywhere near Government buildings.”
Fine Gael Minister of State Colm Brophy said Sinn Féin’s ethos was to “protect the party at all costs” with child protection in a distant second place. He pointed to former senator Ó Donnghaile remaining officially listed as leader of the Seanad until January 2024 when he had been suspended four months earlier over his inappropriate texts to an underage teenage member of the party.
Labour leader Ivana Bacik described some of Ms McDonald’s responses in the Dáil as “incredible”. She could not imagine how complaints of “gross misconduct” about a TD or Senator could be kept from a party leader.
“The buck stops with Ms McDonald as it should,” but “I cannot understand why she did not show any curiosity when it was drawn to her attention that a senior colleague was the subject of a serious complaint.”
Social Democrats leader Holly Cairns said Ms McDonald’s “glowing statement” about former senator Ó Donnghaile when he resigned contrasted with the fact that he “was resigning in disgrace with a referral to the PSNI for inappropriately messaging a minor. And she knew about it”.
Referring to the teenager at the centre of the issue, she said: “I just wondered how that minor felt reading the glowing reference.”
But People Before Profit (PBP) and a number of Independent TDs criticised the Government’s approach. PBP TD Paul Murphy said Mr O’Gorman was the only Government speaker not to use the issue of child protection as a “political football”.
Aontú leader Peadar Tóibín hit out at Government hypocrisy in attacking Sinn Féin. He said that children in State care “are being trafficked and sexually exploited in Ireland right now”. In other countries that would be a national scandal and there would be accountability, he said but the Government “stonewalled”.
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