TD FOR DUBLIN South-West, Paul Murphy, has joined People Before Profit.

Murphy will be joining People Before Profit alongside activists from his party, RISE, after the two groups announced a merger earlier today.

“RISE are very happy to announce that we are joining People Before Profit,” said Murphy.

According to Murphy, he will now be designated as a People Before Profit TD and says that he wants to help build a “broad eco-socialist party.”

“The left is pulling together to fight for workers rights and to fight for the eco-socialist policies that we need to avoid catastrophic climate failure.”

People Before Profit TD’s, Richard Boyd Barrett and Bríd Smith, welcomed the merger with RISE at a press conference this afternoon.

Boyd Barrett also said that the party had seen an increase in membership over the last year, with around “50 to 100 people joining every month for pretty much the last year.”

The party now has approximately 3,000 members according to Boyd Barrett.

Murphy originally left Solidarity in September 2019, before he set up RISE.

Recently, People Before Profit have been advocating for the use of a Zero Covid strategy in Ireland, similarly to how New Zealand have controlled the pandemic.

On the question of a merger between People Before Profit and Solidarity, Boyd Barrett said that while there are a lot of similarities between the two, they differ on the question of a border poll.

“There’s a lot of common ground, but they do differ with us on the question of a border poll,” said Boyd Barrett, saying that People Before Profit wanted to see the island of Ireland united for a different type of Ireland.