TAOISEACH SIMON HARRIS has “no idea” if he will be canvassing with Fine Gael’s Louth candidate John McGahon, who has been criticised over an assault case taken against him in the High Court.
Controversy has surrounded the selection of senator John McGahon as a Fine Gael candidate in Louth after a man who took a civil case was interviewed by The Sunday Times last week, in an article which contained pictures of the injuries he sustained.
McGahon was involved in an altercation with farmer White outside the Rum House pub in Dundalk in 2018.
Though he was acquitted in a 2022 criminal trial of assault causing harm, McGahon was ordered this summer by the High Court to pay White €39,000 after the Castleblayney farmer sued the senator for assault and battery.
According to the Irish Times, the jury found White had been assaulted and awarded €60,000, including €10,000 for aggravated damages. It apportioned blame at 65% against McGahon and the other 35% against the farmer.
A video of the incident has also circulated widely on social media.
During a RTÉ leaders’ debate last night, Harris said that he had not seen the video previously and walked back comments when he previously described what happened as “a scuffle”.
The leader of Fine Gael has been adamant that McGahon is right to be a candidate the basis that the senator was acquitted after the criminal trial. After the debate, Harris said he had “no idea” if he will be canvassing with him before 29 November.
“I have no idea, but I’ll be canvassing right across Ireland. And I visited 27 constituencies so far I think, or certainly will have by tomorrow, I’m enjoying canvassing.”
He added: “I made the point [during the debate] and I’ll make it one more time again tonight. If John McGann was convicted of a criminal offense, he would not be a Fine Gael candidate.
“He has not been convicted of a criminal offense. A jury has looked at all of the CCTV, not part of the CCTV, all of the CCTV. A jury looked at it. A jury heard witnesses. A jury heard from the gardaí and the jury decided he was not criminally guilty of assault.”
Yesterday, Fianna Fáil leader and Tánaiste Micheál Martin said that he was “surprised” that Fine Gael stood by the senator, adding that he believed the “injuries were very severe”.
“There is a victim here and the victim feels that he hasn’t been listened to,” Martin said, adding he was “shocked” by the photographs in the newspaper over the weekend and “didn’t realise at all that it was of that scale”.
“There is very severe cuts and bruises, stitches; I didn’t understand that that was the nature and the severity of the assault.”
Martin also said today that McGahon would not be a candidate with Fianna Fáil “given the circumstances”.
Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald said yesterday that the video circulating of the incident is “very distressing to view”. She said it was “shocking that anybody in public life or anybody at all would behave like that”.
“Simon Harris, rather than dismissing concerns, needs to come out and address them,” she told reporters last night. She earlier said that McGahon would not be a Sinn Féin candidate.
Additional reporting Jane Matthews, Diarmuid Pepper, Cormac Fitzgerald and Stephen McDermott.
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