THE ELECTORAL COMMISSION has ruled that a ‘meeting’ of the National Party’s leadership to dismiss Justin Barrett, which was attended by just one person, was invalid due to insufficient notice.

A dispute between Justin Barrett and James Reynolds, co-founders of the party, has seen both men try to remove the other as an authorised officer for the far-right party under the Register of Political Parties.

Barrett and Reynolds had both separately applied to amend the party’s authorised officers to remove the other but both requests were declined, prompting Reynolds to lodge an appeal against the decision with the Electoral Commission.

In its decision published today, the Electoral Commission details that Reynolds claims he emailed Barrett shortly before midnight on 13 July 2023 inviting him to a meeting of the party’s National Directorate at 7pm the following day. 

A second email was sent at 9.53am the next morning bringing the meeting forward to 2pm.

Neither email contained information about the topics for discussion or any attachment. 

Barrett claims he never received the emails and that they were sent to an email address he seldomly used.

The only person who attended the so-called meeting was Reynolds.

Reynolds claims that he amended the constitution of the party at that meeting and dismissed Barrett from office, leaving himself as the only member of the party’s national directorate. Barrett had himself previously purported to remove Reynolds from office around 3 July 2023.

However, the Electoral Commission has ruled that reasonable notice was not given for the meeting of 14 July.

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Consequently, it was not a validly held meeting of the party’s national directorate and the resolutions claimed to have been made at the meeting were not validly made. 

The far-right party was founded in 2016 amid a series of controversies – including an aborted launch at a Dublin hotel and a provocative interview with its leader Justin Barrett on Today FM.

It describes itself as a “nationalist, Eurosceptic and pro-life” organisation “best known for advocating a reversal of mass-immigration policies”.

The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism has included the party in a list of “far-right hate and extremist groups” operating in Ireland, writing: “The National Party’s platform is anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim, anti-LGBTQ+, Eurosceptic, and oddly for a Catholic party, pro-death penalty.”