The Floating Voter Independent.ie Podcasts

This week’s Floating Voter podcast on Independent.ie took a look at how social media abuse should be tackled by the Government.
Fianna Fáil’s Niamh Smyth and Sinn Féin’s Louise O’Reilly shared their own experiences of some of the hate they have received online.

Deputy O’Reilly revealed that she was this week contacted by Gardaí who inquired about her home security.

She also said that she has been previously targeted by the now-removed Barbara J Pym Twitter account, which former Sunday Independent columnist Eoghan Harris admitted to helping to run.
Cavan Monaghan Deputy Smith, who is the chair of the Oireachtas Arts and Media Committee said that as part of pre-legislative scrutiny into the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill, anonymous accounts on social media should be banned.

She also said that as part of the new legislation, a new Commissioner would be set up which would examine complaints by individuals into online content.

The Commissioner would then work to remove harmful content faster.
“There have to be real sanctions put in place,” said Deputy Smyth.
“These orchestrated pile-ons have to be stopped and that would be what the new online safety commissioner would do,” she added.

Political Editor Philip Ryan and Ms O’Reilly also clashed on anonymous social media accounts after Mr Ryan said that he received a lot of hate online during his coverage of the Sinn Féin Abú database.

Mary Lou McDonald should answer “detailed questions” on Sinn Féin’s internal voter database to ensure her party is not carrying out “Cold War” like profiling of Irish citizens, Labour Party leader Alan Kelly has said.

Mr Kelly said revelations about Sinn Féin’s Abú system posed serious questions for Ms McDonald.

Speaking on Independent.ie’s Floating Voter podcast, the Tipperary TD said: “I think Mary Lou McDonald needs to come out front and face questions in relation to this - very detailed questions.”

“Effectively we need to know if we have a political party that's building a national database on individuals. This would strike back to stuff that was done in the bad times during the Cold War where there was a profile being done on every individual in the country and that would be really scary stuff,” Mr Kelly added.

Sinn Féin has refused to answer questions about where they are storing the information of potentially 3.5m voters, who is managing the system or how the database was funded.

The party has also refused to give any detail on how they have complied with data protection laws in creating a national voter database.

Details of the Abú system came after Independent.ie revealed Sinn Féin representatives were encouraged to “elicit” information from Facebook users which could be cross-referenced with their internal database to locate home addresses of potential supporters.

“I have never heard at a national level that a party is actually profiling every citizen in the State. If information is being stored by a constituency TD, for instance, and that information is being shared to a national system well then that is cause for serious concern,” Mr Kelly said.

“We don't have enough information and Sinn Féin have to answer questions as to whether this is within data protection law, within GDPR. Why is some of this potentially being stored outside the country,” he added.

Green Party Chairperson and Dublin Lord Mayor has admitted that while the chances of her winning a Seanad seat are slim, she has put herself forward for her daughter.

Cllr Hazel Chu is in the running as an independent candidate for a seat on the Commercial and Industrial panel, having failed to secure the backing of her party.

Following her move, there has been discontent in the Green Party, with three Senators putting forward three motions before the parliamentary party meeting last night, one of which was no confidence in the Chair.

Speaking on Independent.ie’s Floating Voter podcast, Cllr Chu said that it is important for her to run for the Seanad, despite a slim chance of winning, for her daughter Alex (3).

“If I’m to be able to look at my three and a half year old in the eye and tell her that we need better representation so that people would see that this is a good thing that people from different minority groups and genders should be in government office, this is what i need to do,” she said.

“It may be a fool’s errand, but on a personal level, and on a professional level, it’s really important to me.

“A lot of my colleagues support me because of that,” she said.

She also apologised for holding an event in St Stephen’s Green for journalists yesterday, where she officially launched her Seanad campaign.

The Irish Independent reports today that Cllr Chu did not seek permission from the Office of Public Works (OPW) to hold that event and that under 1962 bye-laws, political events are not permitted in the park.

“I am very sorry,” she said.

She added that she didn’t think she would get many people to “show” up at the briefing and didn’t realise that she had to seek prior permission.

“I emailed some people, I didn't think they would show up.

“I’m happy to apologise.”

Sinn Féin is taking disciplinary action against councillor Paddy Holohan after he failed to remove a Facebook post supporting a salon owner who reopened in breach of Covid-19 restrictions.

Senior Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty said there is a disciplinary procedure underway after Mr Holohan, who has previously been suspended from the party, failed to remove the post.

“This fella made a comment, we told him that comment isn’t in keeping with the party’s view, we told him to withdraw it, he isn’t doing so, there’s a disciplinary procedure, the party will deal with that,” Mr Doherty told Independent.ie’s The Floating Voter podcast.

In a post on his Facebook page last month, Mr Holohan described C&N Beauty Room owner Christine McTiernan as “inspiring” after she was arrested by gardaí for opening her business during Level 5 restrictions.

Mr Holohan has previously been suspended from the party over derogatory comments about women and Tánaiste Leo Varadkar. Mr Doherty said on Friday that while there was huge frustration with restrictions there was consensus around the need for the public health measures.

Elsewhere in a wide-ranging discussion, Mr Doherty said that Sinn Féin is preparing itself for a general election, noting there is a lot of internal tension in the coalition parties.

“Those things bring on elections, a leadership challenge in Fine Gael or indeed Fianna Fáil can actually bring on an election. Do I believe it [the Government] will last? I don’t know, all I know is that we’re getting ready, we’re selecting our candidates, we’re making sure we have enough candidates in the field," the party's finance spokesperson said.

He noted that the party had “left a number of seats behind us” in the last election because it did not run enough candidates in certain constituencies.

Mr Doherty also defended Sinn Féin’s role in failing to secure cross-border consensus on Covid-19 restrictions, insisting it was not possible because of the DUP’s reluctance. He said criticism of Sinn Féin for this was “like saying isn’t it terrible that Sinn Féin can’t convince the DUP that Brexit is bad”.

The Donegal TD criticised the UK government’s unilateral decision this week to extend post-Brexit grace periods for Northern Ireland without consultation with the EU, saying it was “really, really bad faith”.

He also said that the State had ‘no option” but to stop doing business with Davy Stockbrokers after it was hit with a record €4.1m fine by the Central Bank for regulatory breaches.