At Leinster House
THE last time a Sinn Fein TD from Limerick entered Dáil Éireann, the political landscape in Ireland was a very different place, Ireland was a very different place – it was the early 1920s.
Yeats won the Noble Prize for Literature, orders were signed creating the Revenue Commissioners, deValera is arrested and Limerick had its last Sinn Fein representative.
But when Maurice Quinlivan stepped through the gates of Leinster House on a Spring morning in 2016, his confidence matched the dapper three piece suit, burgundy shoes and metaphorically broad shoulders.
Deputy Quinlivan was bridging a gap of generations and he had the full support of his closest family. As he noted on the night he was elected in February, Deputy Quinlivan said that he was saddened that his late father could not have witnessed his 10,000 plus haul of votes to land him a seat at the 32nd Dail – “he would have been proud”.
To the job at hand and Limerick city’s newest TD had more than a sense of purpose about his manner, as he was clearly in Dublin not just to make up the numbers.
Setting the emotion of the day briefly to one side, Deputy Quinlivan said that “we wanted to be in Government and that was the platform we ran on” but he accepted that unless his party was the lead group in any Government, “supporting Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael is obviously not something we were elected to do”.
The former Sinn Fein councillor said that his party was in talks with other minor groupings to form an alternative Government “but the numbers seem to be suggesting a Fianna Fáil Fine Gael Government.”
Noting that a Sinn Fein Ard Fheis was scheduled for the end of next month, Deputy Quinlivan said there was unlikely to be a softening of that stance and that he just couldn’t see them being in Government with either party.
“That’s not what we were elected on and it may come as a surprise to some people but we keep our promises”, deputy Quinlivan said who stated that “we wouldn’t be a second fiddle to Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael”.
