THIN, wiry and intense, Richard Greene is a man who annoys a lot of people in Irish political circles. His small party, Muintir na hEireann (English translation, "Family of Ireland") was officially registered in April last year and is now preparing to fight its first general election.
Greene's main focus of political interest is the family, which he sees as the basic unit of society. If the family is under attack, then society in general suffers. And he believes the liberal establishment is placing the family unit, and therefore society itself, in jeopardy.
According to Greene there has been a decline in the quality of life and he is unhappy about "the society that has now emerged as a consequence of what is called the liberal agenda, where there's a murder nearly every day of the week". He justifies this startling causal link as follows: "The policies of the so called liberal political establishment have weakened the family link in society."
He condemns "political leaders who even in their own personal lives are promoting policies that are anti family". Greene warms to his theme: "If you, say, trust your child to be educated by a teacher you hope that he's not a childabuser; if you go to the doctor you hope that the doctor is going to cure you. Likewise, if you want your society to be run in an efficient and effective way for the future citizens you entrust it to people who can manage their own families and personal lives and run them efficiently and effectively.
When confronted by politicians seeking votes, the electorate "should look at their personal lives and see how they manage their families". He is worried about the private morality of some of our politicians and his party intends to make it an issue in the general election.
The renewal he seeks will not require a landslide: "We believe if we get even one or two people elected to the next Dail, that the political establishment will have to take our agenda seriously."
It is not an agenda that appeals to everyone. Muintir na hEireann sparked off a bitter controversy during the divorce referendum when a spokesman pointed out that the Minister promoting the referendum, Mervyn Taylor, and the director of communications for the Fine Gael campaign, Alan Shatter, were both Jewish. Muintir na hEireann asked them to "show more sensitivity" and suggested that they "may not have a full understanding of Christian marriage".
The party was widely condemned as anti Semitic. Greene denies the charge but refuses to disown the remarks, claiming they were misrepresented. "They were a statement of fact: that the two most prominent leaders for the introduction of divorce into this country were members of the Jewish community; that this country is predominantly Catholic and Christian and so on, and that they may not have been fully aware of the sensitivities that a predominantly Catholic country would have towards marriage.
As Greene sees it, the Preamble to the Constitution defines this State as "more or less" a Christian one. "In effect, the State is governed by a Christian constitution and it was an issue of changing a fundamental Christian point of view on the issue of divorce.
Born in Dublin in 1950, Greene attended national school in Clontarf and secondary at O'Connell's. He studied English Literature and became a secondary teacher. He now works as a career guidance counsellor in a Dublin school.
Having taught quietly for about a decade he was drawn into politics by the republican hunger strikes in the early 1980s. This was followed by campaigns on behalf of the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four "when they weren't very politically correct". He became deeply involved in the opposition to extradition of Irish republicans to Britain.
Around the same time, "as a bit of an interest", he joined Fianna Fail and set up an anti extradition group within the party. Tensions developed between him and the party establishment and led to his expulsion at a national executive meeting. "When you're thrown out of an establishment party you suddenly realise that the police don't treat you the same." He claims he was "tailed" by the Special Branch and that his employers were told he was an IRA supporter.
He joined the Green Party and ran as a "no hope" candidate for Dublin County Council in Clonskeagh. But as soon as it became obvious he was going to be elected after all, he says a leading Green activist warned him: "You're not to say anything on extradition."
His conservative views on issues such as abortion raised the hackles of some of his party colleagues. "The Greens' policy on abortion was hypocritical: they had no policy. They had a 16 page policy document on animal rights and yet they had no policy on human life.
He gradually became disillusioned: "Deep down I discovered that the Green agenda really was, in fact, towards population control because ultimately some of them are so into the protection of the environment that people - too many people - are seen as a pollutant."
A motion was tabled for his expulsion from the party for public breaches of party policy on a range of issues, and Greene recalls that, when the expulsion was being discussed, he resigned. He ran as an independent candidate in Dublin South in the 1992 general election, securing 1,671 first preferences.
He was invited to join what is now the Christian Solidarity Party but claims it was "riven with factions", so he And his friends launched Muintir na hEireann. Their application to register as a political party was initially refused, but the ruling was overturned on appeal.
The party was on the militant wing of the campaign against divorce. "The results very clearly showed that 49 per cent, which is nearly half the population of the country, are represented by political parties that don't actually speak for them on this issue and a whole lot of other issues as well." He wants the £500,000 which was unconstitutionally spent by the Government promoting divorce to be returned to the Exchequer.
Muintir na hEireann aims to run "about six or seven" candidates in the general election, including two or three in Dublin and possibly someone to oppose Dick spring in Kerry North. Muintir na hEireann is opposed to political integration with the European Union and favours a return to the old concept of an economic union rather than progressing towards a "united states of Europe".
How this tune is received in a constituency which has been the recipient of so much EU largess is another matter. But it is certain that Greene will continue to annoy the other parties no end.