THE NEWLY ELECTED Green Party leader Roderic O’Gorman said he would not be proposing a Cabinet reshuffle of his party’s ministers, meaning Eamon Ryan and Catherine Martin will remain in their current roles.
His contender for the leadership Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Pippa Hackett and the other Green junior ministers such as Malcolm Noonan, Ossian Smyth and Joe O’Brien, will also remain in their current posts.
O’Gorman said he is “extremely confident” in the expertise and the knowledge of the Green Party ministers.
“They’ve all done amazing work in their individual departments,” he said.
“So, I won’t be proposing a cabinet reshuffle or indeed any reshuffle of the Green ministers or ministers of state. We have an amazing team and we’re going to use that team to deliver for us into the last months of government and into delivering a powerful manifesto and a powerful general election campaign when that election is held,” he said.
Speaking to the media after he was announced the new leader, O’Gorman said he wants to see the government going the full term.
He also outlined some of his priorities for the months ahead, stating that he wants to invest more in childcare, something he will have to push for in the run up to this year’s budget.
O’Gorman said he will shortly seek government approval to ratify the Optional Protocol on the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, stating that at “long last”, it will fully vindicate the rights of people with disabilities in this country.
He added that he also wants to legislate to allow women with serious illnesses to delay their maternity leave, something a number of opposition parties have been calling for.
Hate speech legislation is also something the new Green Party leader wants to see progressed.
“I want to do more to ensure the state protects the safety of minorities within our communities by legislating to outlaw for hate crimes,” he said.
Justice Minister Helen McEntee has indicated she’s looking to bring forward some amendments to the legislation that deal with some concerns that have been raised.
The legislation received strong support in the Dáil, with O’Gorman stating that it is really important that the legislation is brought to the Seanad early in the autumn term.
On the issue of migration, O’Gorman said if someone is saying something he disagrees with politically, he will strongly advocate for his position
“And if someone is saying something that is factually wrong, I will never be afraid to call that out,” he said, adding that in particular, debates on the issues of migration can be “deeply, deeply frustrating”.
He said the debate on migration has to be one that is based on facts.
“It can’t be on the basis of ‘this one thing I saw on Facebook one time’, which unfortunately too often is the standard of debate that we’re seeing in Dail Eireann right now,” said O’Gorman, who was then applauded by his party members.
With the summer economic statement due to be published this week, O’Gorman said he doesn’t want the next budget to be about “pre-election giveaways”, stating instead it has to be about serious and significant investment in public services.
O’Gorman also put his coalition parties on notice today by stating that after the next general election, he will be speaking with other left parties, before his party will speak with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil.
“In a post-election scenario, yes, I would speak to progressive parties initially,” he confirmed.
While he said there has been a “good working arrangement” with the coalition partners, it is the policies contained in the programme for government that are the priority for the Greens.
“What we’re most interested in is the programme, is the policies contained in there, and if we can get more Green Party policies, progressive policies in a programme for government, we will always work to achieve that,” he said.
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