Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
Updated 11pm
FINE GAEL’S NOMINEE for the Seanad, John McNulty, has announced he is stepping down from the board of the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) in the wake of controversy over his appointment to the position.
McNulty said his resignation is an accordance with IMMA’s own internal rules which preclude him from being a board member and contesting an election at the same time.
He said he will continue his campaign to be elected to the Seanad and will remain a member of IMMA. His statement in full:
“I am stepping down from the IMMA board with immediate effect, in accordance with IMMA’s internal rules, which preclude me from being a board member and contesting an election at the same time. I will continue to be a member of IMMA, and an active supporter of their work. I look forward to continuing my election campaign, for a seat in the Seanad.”
Tonight, one of McNulty’s opponents in the by-election, independent candidate Gerard Craughwell has written to the Seanad clerk and returning officer Deirdre Lane requesting that McNulty be removed from the ballot paper.
The former TUI president contends that McNulty is no longer eligible following his resignation from the IMMA board.
Craughwell states in an email to Lane: “As Mr McNulty’s has now resigned from that board and we now know he never attended any meetings of that board nor did he participate in any functional way with the board of IMMA I believe that Mr McNulty is no longer eligible to stand as a candidate for election.”
Craughwell is one of three candidates for the by-election of TDs and Senators with Sinn Féin putting forward Catherine Seeley. Ballot papers are due to be issued to Oireachtas members tomorrow with a result expected on 10 October.
Earlier this afternoon, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said McNulty’s decision to step down was in line with the rules of the IMMA board with which he was being “perfectly cooperative”.
He also told reporters at the National Ploughing Championships that he thinks he has only met McNulty once before and there were over 20 expressions of interest in the seat.
Mr McNulty is a man with a great deal of experience, a great deal of energy, a gret deal of committment that he will bring to Seanad Eireann. So, they can’t all be winners, they can’t all be reappointed.
Before that the Arts Minister Heather Humphreys refused to say whether McNulty applied for the position she appointed him to.
The minister is under pressure after it emerged she appointed McNulty to the board of IMMA six days before he was confirmed as Fine Gael’s nominee for the Seanad by-election. Humphreys also wouldn’t say whether she was aware he was the party’s pick for the Seanad when she appointed him.
Speaking to reporters at an event in the National Museum in Dublin today, Humphreys said: “I appointed him to the board of IMMA based on his ability to make a good contribution to the board of IMMA.”
Asked what contribution McNulty can make if he’s only on the board of IMMA for three weeks – he will have to resign once elected to the Seanad – Humphreys said:
“I looked at his credentials, and he had indicated an interest in serving on the board. I felt he was a good person and I think it’s important to remember that anybody who serves on the board of IMMA, as with all the other boards, it’s on a voluntary basis.”
She also claimed she was not aware that one of the overlooked candidates for the Seanad, Samantha Long, had resigned from the party this morning.
Tánaiste Joan Burton has said that Fine Gael’s nomination of John McNulty for the Seanad by-election is not a matter for the Labour Party.
Burton was speaking at Leaders’ Questions in the Dáil today as the controversy over McNulty’s appointment to the board of the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) – just six days before his nomination for the Seanad by election – rumbled on.
“What we’re talking about is a standard practice in relation to the filling of casual vacancies,” Burton said of Fine Gael’s selection of McNulty for the seat vacated by Deirdre Clune.
As she was pressed on the matter by Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald, Burton insisted repeatedly: “It’s not a matter for the Labour Party. It’s a matter for Fine Gael.”
McDonald was thwarted in her attempts to raise McNulty’s appointment to the board of IMMA by the Ceann Comhairle who said the Sinn Féin deputy leader could not raise questions about McNulty’s qualifications in the Dáil.
As Burton tried to address the IMMA appointment issue the Ceann Comhairle intervened to tell her she was over time.
Overnight, Taoiseach defended the decision to select McNulty describing it as, “the right of the leader of the day to decide who should be nominated.”
Kenny said McNulty’s appointment to the board of IMMA was made by Arts Minister Heather Humphreys “in her own right”.
Several TDs expressed their anger at how the party had handled the selection of John McNulty to take Deirdre Clune’s vacant seat in the upper house.
McNulty himself spoke at the Fine Gael meeting and even those who were most critical of the controversy said that it wasn’t about him – it was about how it was handled.
One TD said: “He seems like a very good candidate. So why did we f*** it up for him.”
Many Labour TDs are understood to be unhappy with what they see as “stroke politics”.
Speaking in the US during a Famine Memorial Ceremony, Kenny said, “I hope that John McNulty will prove to be an outstanding Senator. He is a young man with considerable energy and potential.”
Addressing criticism over gender balance, the Taoiseach added:
“Well I saw some commentary about this in respect of gender balance. The two candidates in the Dail by elections, Cait Keane and Maura Hopkins, speak for themselves and are well able to represent themselves and are doing so hopefully will win those elections.
The person I appointed to chair the party’s electoral strategy, Justice Minister Frances Fitzgerald, is also a woman… So comments about appointments and non appointments don’t stand up in that regard.
“Fine Gael is the party that has made most running here in terms of having more women appointed.”
McNulty is expected to meet with senior Labour members today.
- additional reporting from Cliodhna Russell, Órla Ryan, Dan McGuill and Michelle Hennessy.
First published 8.25am
Good luck to her. Hopefully some of the other finalists get a chance to launch their ideas as well
It must be awkward carrying that big phone.
People tend to use the same GP because patient history is one of the most important diagnostic elements. Will this be a problem for her model?
It maybe I’ve just been watching too much House…
Ignoreland…..perhaps the patients history could be put into a database and be accessed by the patient using a P.I.N?
For a country the size of Ireland, it should be possible to network the whole system. If I have an injury in donegal then it should be possible for them to access my records even though I’m based in the Midlands.
Email should be a given instead of slow mail when gp’s are writing a referral. Plus text message reminders for out patient appointments.
It’s more complicated than you would imagine to have digital health records.
Way to go girl, good on you great idea
Well done to her. I hope she focuses on Ireland though, not just Dublin.
Best idea I’ve heard of since Google! Go girl!
Who gives out these awards? No website, no App, only an idea. This idea will die in the crib. Taxi drivers in UK are trying to make Uber and Halo illegal. Trying to do the same thing in the medical industry (a hugely regulated industry with powerful unions) is stupid. This lady will be eaten for breakfast. Might work in medical areas that are not regulated, like Chinese medicine. Saying “you go girl” without thinking critically about the idea is really patronising to her.
Don’t get me wrong, I wish we lived in a world where this app would be successful. I am no lover of unions and government regulations, but a business has to work in the real world
i think the idea of the compeition is to win funds to develop,test, launch so those end user products will come. never put the cart before the horse. having an app and a website before having a solid idea with promise never really works, your app and website just sits there doing nothing. i’m sure she has a rough visual prototype, presentation etc of how it works to pitch with.
having said that, i do see problems with the idea itself. GPs as we all know are expensive, “more business for GPs” – cry me a river, canceled appointments is of no loss to GPs, patients reschedule and in many cases theres a cancel fee. Would it mean triple travel expenses for call out fees? A travel expense in GPs terms could be a taxi fare x 3. There are approx 2million medical and GP-visit cards in use here as well. How does it cater for them, and with regarding travel fees. I don’t think the HSE will pay for it no more than old age free travel covers taxi fares. So, back to private customers. If they can afford it then great then thats her target market. I think the fees involved, how many ‘private users’ will sign up for it and of course access to medical records, data security and release of said data would ideas for the app to overcome.
@Alan From an acorn can grow a mighty oak. Ideas are everything.
@patrick, ideas and nothing, implementation is everything. Google didn’t come up with the idea of a search engine, Microsoft didn’t come up with the idea of a computer operating system. Implementation is everything
We need the same for Doctors. I couldn’t even find a reliable site by googling. Doctor app please together with consultancy fee. Thank you.
Good luck to her. I hope that this proposed alternative delivery of healthcare is not a platform for inexperienced professionals (who can’t work in the health system due to recruitment embargo of past few years) to get work. My issue with this is that for some patients who are vulnerable – they may be paying for a service that isn’t top quality. Finally, I look forward to the other 23 applicants proposals to be reported by the journal.
This young lady and her ingenious click clinic app has possibly doubled or trebled the market for the medical professionals offering those services.
Disruptive technology at its most effective!
Well done to her!
Good on ye lass hope it gets taken on.
Is disruptive the new “in-word”?
Have seen this of Twitter and as a fellow physio I see flaws in the business model!! Already websites like what clinic and generally find its more cost effective to invest in google Seo on our own website! But u know what folks fair play to her she is pushing an idea she has into reality!! How many of us have had ideas and never done anything about them!!! My wee bit of advice if the young lady does read this is under promise and over deliver!!
I always worry when I see words like ‘entrepreneur’ and ‘health’ used in the same sentence. That immediately puts me off. But good luck to her and the others too with their inventions.
Unfortunately it’s a zero sum game. There will always be people waiting as long as the health service is understaffed. In fact, it seems unfair that the young tech-savvy people with the app are going to get treatment faster than, and possibly at the expense of, the older people
Well done and best of luck with the idea!
have your say