Zappone controversy ‘handled very badly’, former FG TD says

Former Fine Gael TD Kate O’Connell has criticised the “disconnect” shown by politicians who attended an outdoor party of 50 people organised by former Independent minister Katherine Zappone.

Ms O’Connell said that while outdoor events with up to 200 attendees were legally permissible when the function took place on July 21st, it “wasn’t a done thing at the time”.

Speaking on RTÉ’s Brendan O’Connor radio show, Ms O’Connell said the fallout fallout regarding Ms Zappone’s planned appointment as a UN special envoy had been “handled very badly”.

It would appear that Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney could have been “better prepared” in providing documents and establishing a consistent story.

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The handling of the planned appointment, which Ms Zappone has since declined to take up, is “emblematic of what people suspect goes on behind the scenes” in politics, Ms O’Connell said.

“If your children were behaving like this you would say would you stop carrying on like that and just hand over those phones,” she said.

Byelection

Speaking on the result of the byelection in her former constituency of Dublin Bay South in July, Ms O’Connell said she was pleased to see a progressive and pro-choice woman elected to the Dáil.

“I think Ivana Bacik is a wonderful public representative with a history behind her. I wouldn’t like to get into whether I would have won it or not because it didn’t happen for me,” she said.

The pharmacist said she “would have loved to have been the candidate” but would never have been chosen for the race. Ms O’Connell hinted that she would like to contribute to Dáil politics again in the future, but she did not believe this could happen while Leo Varadkar is leader of the party.

“I have an interest in politics. As for elected office, I don’t know what is ahead. I am not going to rule it in or out,” she added.

Ms O’Connell previously said her working relationship with Mr Varadkar never recovered from the 2017 party leadership campaign in which she had supported Mr Coveney and had described Mr Varadkar’s backers as “choirboys” who were “singing for their supper”.

Taoiseach Micheál Martin has moved again to play down the continuing controversy over Mr Coveney’s deletion of texts from Ms Zappone - which Mr Coveney said had been done because his phone was previously hacked.

Speaking in Co Cork on Saturday, Mr Martin said he expected information due to be released by the Department of Foreign Affairs on the planned appointment of Ms Zappone as a UN Special Envoy would clarify matters.

“I don’t get involved in that or embroil myself in terms of the presentation that he [Mr Coveney] will make to the committee,” said Mr Martin, adding that he was confident that Mr Coveney would clarify matters fully when he appears again before the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs Committee.

Asked if he believed Ms Zappone should appear before the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs committee, Mr Martin again stressed there needs to be a sense of perspective about the issue as he re-iterated Ms Zappone had not taken up the position of UN special envoy on freedom of opinion and expression.