'Meath West has been treated diastrously by this Government'

MEATH WEST CANDIDATE FOCUS: PEADAR TOIBIN (AONTU)

Peadar Tóibín might not use the term “make or break” as the General Election looms but if he is not joined by at least one Aontú Party TD in the Dail his critics are bound to say “this is a one-man band” .

Just a couple of days after sitting down to an interview with the Meath Chronicle the latest opinion poll shows Aontú at four per cent alongside the Green Party. Such slow climbs in the opinion polls are hard to achieve for smaller parties but Tóibín can afford to feel some element of satisfaction, especially since the local elections when the party won eight council seats, among them some prospects for a Dáil seat.

The party has targeted seven constituencies where it says it can win a seat. Over 30 candidates will go on the ballot paper. Half of the candidates are women selected, as Tóibín says, totally on merit with the party shying away from imposing quotas. “This is organic and it’s on merit”, he says.

He mentioned Cavan – Monaghan, Dublin West (two councillors elected), Wexford, Cork North West, Limerick, Mayo, along with Meath West are the targeted seats. Meath East is another constituency on the “possible seat” list. The Meath West TD brushes aside the “one man band” doubts, maintaining that Aontu has come of age”.

“We are the only party which fought the Referendums and won, no other political party had the backbone to do that. In the European elections we came ahead of Labour, the Soc Dems, People before Profit. 73,000 votes is a considerable vote. I don’t think people realise, we are a bigger party than those three parties. In the polls we are polling about four per cent and the polling companies put us at between three and five seats potentially to win in this election”.

He accepts that that is not going to be easy to achieve because in some of these areas they are batting incumbents who have been there for some time but he believes they will take seats in this election.

“Even if we don’t the necessity for Aontú is still there and I believe we will still continue to grow and fight elections. I believe we will bring in 20 councillors at the next Local Elections, then in the next General Election we will be in an even stronger position to take seats”.

Aontú is a long-term project he points out. “When I joined Sinn Fein they had one TD and half a dozen councillors. We are a group of Irish people, ordinary individuals, who are really frustrated at the damage being done to this country and believe that there has to be a well organised response”.

Tóibín is now 50 with 28 years of active political life behind him. Politics is a tough and wearing game and he admits that his own rate of activity over the last five years will be hard to sustain.

"I always say to my people that we have to get State funding because it will add another 10 years to my life. I do believe the party is strengthening, there is far more experience around, far more knowledge, far more experienced hands at the tiller. Ok, the pressure isn’t coming off but at least there’s no increased pressure”.

There were challenges during those five years, particularly during Covid when the emergent party foot soldiers weren’t able to knock on doors. It’s put to him that the Government parties might have “a good story to tell” in relation to Meath West but he dismisses that out of hand.

“Definitely not. I think Meath West has been treated disastrously by this Government. We have the lowest number of gardai in the country per capita, we have the lowest number of GPs. I know one man who called 19 GPs and couldn’t get onto their patient list. There are 250,000 people living in Meath and the Government have not kept up with investment alongside that population growth at all. 80,000 people get into their cars every day to go to work. We have the biggest town in the country without a rail line. We have an A&E that has an ambulance bypass, a stroke bypass, a heart bypass and it is a written objective of the HSE to close Navan A&E. Even when we are looking at the horror of Limerick UL, it is still the situation here. Meath is suffering significantly because of this Government”.

What is his view as he nears the starting gate for the election. “Over the last five years I have worked as hard as I can and I can honestly say that I couldn’t put any more into it than I have done. We have the busiest constituency office in Meath – we have one here in Navan, one in Trim and will open one in Athboy shortly. I have mentioned Navan more times in the Dail than any TD in history, I have mentioned Trim more times in the Dail than any other TD and the same goes for Athboy. He also believes he has led campaigns on a range of issues, such as immigration, accountability issues. I have been a very strong voice for in Leinster House for common sense but I take nothing for granted. My attitude is you take nothing for granted in this game. The political graveyard is full of fellows who took things for granted.