IN A SIGN of another divide emerging within Fine Gael, party TD Lucinda Ceighton has hit out against ‘cute-hoor politics’.

Creighton was speaking about standards in public life at the MacGill Summer School in Donegal. Read the speech in full here.

She said Fine Gael could not condemn Fianna Fáil for entertaining developers at the Galway races while doing the same itself.

Creighton was referring to a golf classic held at the K Club last week at which the party solicited donations from many developers whose loans had been transferred to NAMA.

She said:

Fine Gael cannot equivocate about the standards we wish to bring to the running of this Republic.

We need a real “New Politics” – of substance rather than sound-bites.

We need a politics that is about serving the people of Ireland, and not simply about replacing Fianna Fáil.

It is time for a politics built on courage, integrity and truth. That is the politics which I signed up for and the sort of public service which the Irish people so desperately need.

Creighton has been congratulated by Green Party TD Paul Gogarty for “belatedly discovering the truth” about her party.

“The only problem is that I fear that she may be slamming the stable door long after the horse has bolted,” Gogarty said, pointing out that FG-led local councils were among those involved in rezoning scandals.

Yesterday Phil Hogan, director of elections for Fine Gael defended the party’s decision to take donations from troubled developers.