Dail moves to resolve dispute which delayed taoiseach nomination
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The process of nominating a new taoiseach faced an unprecedented day-long delay due to a heated dispute over opposition speaking rights. The row involved TDs shouting at each other in the Dail on Wednesday, interruptions characterised as “farcical” and “stunt politics on speed” as well as accusations of “barracking”, “bullying” and “intimidation”.
Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin was ultimately successfully confirmed as Taoiseach on Thursday, but criticised the delay as a “subversion of the Irish Constitution”. Central to the row was a move to allocate opposition speaking time to some independents who had been involved in government formation talks.
Four of those independents had joined a technical group, which is a mechanism designed to allow opposition TDs to sit in groupings to gain an allocation of speaking time. This has been widely rejected by opposition parties, including Sinn Fein, Labour and the Social Democrats, who argued that the independents who supported the incoming government should not be considered opposition TDs.
Opposition parties said allowing the Government-affiliated independents to use opposition speaking time would dilute the practice of holding government to account and eat into their time to raise issues. Mr Martin was expected to be nominated on Wednesday, but the interruptions and objections from the opposition resulted in the Dail being suspended multiple times, before being adjourned until Thursday.
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