The Progressive Democrats are on the verge of making seven new staff appointments as part of a major expansion of the party's backroom staff decided upon after the May local and European elections.
Mr Séamus Mulconry is to become its new director of policy. Mr Mulconry (39), is a senior manager with Accenture, the information technology services and consultancy firm.
He said yesterday that his role would be to work with parliamentary party members and ordinary party members "to craft innovative policies that will make tangible differences to people's lives". He said he believed the party needed to have "three to five issues and policies to focus on that the public are aware of and that are relevant to people".
Mr Mulconry was the director of communications for the Alliance for Europe, the civic society campaign in favour of the Nice Treaty in the second referendum. He holds a first-class honours degree in English and history from St Patrick's College Drumcondra, and a Masters in business administration from Trinity College Dublin.
The party has recently appointed Mr Ian Gill as youth research officer, and the process of recruiting a director of communications is believed to be at an advanced state. They are appointing four regional directors, one for each Euro constituency. Ms Maria Burke, in the North West, is the only one appointed so far.
A party spokeswoman said yesterday that the salaries of the new appointees will be paid out of the party's own funds garnered through fundraising and donations, and are not paid for from State funding, or the new funding provided for political staff through the new Oireachtas Commission. She said an internal review group set up after the May elections had concluded that the party had a shortage of staff.
