TAOISEACH LEO VARADKAR, Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald and People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy all had their homes targeted at the weekend by anti-immigration protesters.
An Garda Síochana confirmed to The Journal that gardaí received reports of people gathering outside the homes of the politicians on Saturday evening.
In each case, those present dispersed with no offences disclosed, according to the gardaí.
Speaking to The Journal, Murphy described Saturday’s protest, the second to take place outside of his home this year, as “disturbing”.
On Saturday evening, a group of approximately 10 people, many masked, gathered outside of Murphy’s home in Tallaght with placards and a large poster stating ‘South Dublin Says No. Close the Borders.’
Last April, a similar protest was held just as Murphy and his partner Jess Spear were preparing to give their newborn a bath.
Murphy said the protesters this weekend also happened to arrive as he and his partner were about to bathe their baby.
According to Murphy the protesters arrived outside of his home at around 7.30pm on Saturday evening and stayed for approximately 45 minutes.
Photos taken by Murphy show those gathered with yellow placards adorned with phrases like ‘Irish Lives Matter’, ‘Why are military-aged men fleeing war?’, and ‘Illegal male immigrants are housed before the Irish homeless’.
Murphy told The Journal that he and his partner rang the gardaí who arrived approximately 50 minutes later, just after the protesters had left.
According to Murphy the latest protesters went further than previous ones by ringing the doorbell, something they did not do in April.
“Let’s say Jess or I opened the door, what was going to happen? How did they envisage that playing out?,” Murphy asked.
Because I don’t think they were here for a reasonable exchange of opinions.
“I don’t know what their purpose was with that.
“Last time it was a bit more low-key really, they were there, but this time they put the banner on the ground across the front of my driveway. They were very much looking in the windows with the placards. It was a step up from the last time,” Murphy said.
In Murphy’s view, the protest aimed to intimidate him and his family.
“I’ve obviously been involved in many protests in my life. And the vast majority of them are designed to raise awareness of an issue, to make a point. And so they’re aimed at the public, winning public support.
But this is a protest in a cul de sac in a housing estate in Tallaght, there is no passing traffic, there’s no nothing.
“So it clearly is a protest that’s aimed at intimidating and from my point of view, it is disturbing, but also I’m not going to be intimidated by it.
“I think that would be a victory for the kind of politics of hate and division and fear and so on that they’re trying to promote,” Murphy said.
Counterproductive
Murphy explained that his view has always been that it is never right to target a person’s home or family, even when others advocated for it.
“Sometimes in campaigns, we’ve been involved in in the past, like the water charges, the household tax, the bin tax, sometimes the idea would come up from people who were very angry to say, you know, we should take it to their homes.
“And we, the socialist left would always argue against it. Arguing that it was not correct to target people’s families, to target their family homes and that it would be counterproductive. And within all those campaigns, we always won that argument.
“So we’ve never supported or participated in any protests at people’s homes. And I don’t think people should be protesting at people’s homes,” Murphy said.
Murphy maintains the view however that shutting down protests or legislating to prevent protests outside of politicians’ homes is not the answer, describing it as “a slippery slope”.
Instead, he said people who recognise the threat of the far-right need to come together and show that the vast majority of people do not agree with their politics or their tactics.
“Forget about what happened to us, which is pretty small beans compared to the serious number of centres for asylum seekers now being burned out around the country, not a single arrest anywhere. People who recognise what is happening here need to come together,” Murphy said.
The Taoiseach and Mary Lou McDonald did not respond to The Journal‘s request for comment on the matter.
In recent years, there has been a controversial increase in protesters taking their causes to the doors of politicians’ homes, with the Taoiseach and Dublin South West TD Paul Murphy both previously targeted.
The Taoiseach said recently that despite a warning from the Garda Commissioner that there is a heightened threat to his personal safety, he will not change his routine.
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