Sinn Féin has pledged to win back its working-class base during the general election campaign as Mary Lou McDonald admitted recent mistakes had cost the party support.
Speaking alongside members of her front bench outside Government buildings after Taoiseach Simon Harris had left for Áras an Uachtaráin, Ms McDonald urged voters to back her party and install a Government without Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael.
Earlier in the day, Tánaiste and Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin ruled out coalition with Sinn Féin under his leadership. But Ms McDonald said she was willing to talk to all parties after the election – with the caveat that her preference would be to lead a government without either Civil War party.
“[What] I have never ruled out is I will talk to everybody. I’ve made no secret about that,” she said
“I remember after the last election, people were turning up their noses and saying they wouldn’t speak. Apparently, we weren’t good enough ... So I’m not going to insult the citizens and voters by taking a position like that. I will talk to people, but our preferred outcome, to be absolutely clear, is a new government without Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael.”
She said recent policy mistakes had cost the party support.
[ Fintan O'Toole: An unhappy Ireland prepares for a general electionOpens in new window ]
“Did we, at times, do things, make mistakes along the way? Yes, we did, and we got called out on that, as you know, by our working-class base, and that’s fair enough.”
Asked to specify what errors had been made, she said supporting the Government’s failed referendums on family and care in March had been a mistake.
She did not mention immigration policy, widely seen to have been a cause of splintering Sinn Féin’s base.
Following a series of controversies which have dogged the party, Ms McDonald did not directly address whether she was concerned these issues would follow her around the campaign trail – but said no complaints had been made against any of the party’s 71 general election candidates. Asked if any had engaged in inappropriate behaviour, she said she did not engage in inappropriate behaviour, adding: “I don’t know who you’re directing that at.”
She said she leads a team of people of “character and integrity”.
Regarding the former Sinn Féin press officer Michael McMonagle, who was on Friday sentenced for child sex crimes, she said justice had been served and that her thoughts were with the victims. Asked if the scandals had damaged her party, she said Sinn Féin was strong and facing into the “general election campaign of a generation, maybe even a lifetime”.
“Those that have held reins of power for a century think that this election is a foregone conclusion that they will have it all their own way again and simply walk back into Government Buildings. But the Irish people will have something to say about that,” she said.
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