Boyd Barrett emerges victorious in leaders’ debate – colleagues

People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett "absolutely" won the RTÉ leaders' debate on Monday night his colleagues have claimed.

Cllr Bríd Smith said Mr Boyd Barrett did not complicate the ideas or arguments.

“He did very well in articulating what most people know is the solution,” which was to redistribute wealth from the rich throughout society, said Cllr Smith.

The People Before Profit Dublin South Central candidate denied that Mr Boyd Barrett had stumbled in the debate on the issue of Garda stations and did not appear to have a policy on the issue.

Cllr Smith said her colleague had stated “quite explicitly” that if people felt they needed their local Garda station back, “he was supportive of that demand”, because rural areas had experienced the “triple whammy of losing their post offices, banks and businesses”.

The issue of crime was not teased out sufficiently during the debate said Cllr Smith, adding that the “roots of drug crime and gang crime have to be tackled.

“Instead of putting more resources into inner city and deprived areas throughout the country, kids are dragged into crime because of a lack of emphasis on their education and their needs and development”, she said.

She stressed that “cuts in youth services and drugs services are absolutely feeding into the idea that many of those kids will end up with guns in their hands and end up as part of drug gangs”.

“You can’t look at crime without looking at the roots of it and deal with the roots and the cuts to services are outrageous and need to be reversed.”

Cllr Smith was speaking to reporters outside Irish Water headquarters as the Anti-Austerity Alliance and People Before Profit tore up their water charges bills. They claimed that through the general election water charges could be abolished.

The grouping also launched another anti-water charges protest which is to take place this Saturday at 2pm in Dublin city centre.