{"id":3188,"date":"2025-09-06T10:15:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T10:15:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/3188\/"},"modified":"2025-09-06T10:15:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T10:15:08","slug":"simon-harris-bans-fine-gael-councillors-from-helping-independents-get-on-presidential-ticket","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/3188\/","title":{"rendered":"Simon Harris bans Fine Gael councillors from helping Independents get on presidential ticket"},"content":{"rendered":"

BREAKING\u00a0|\u00a0\"Tanaiste<\/p>\n

Tanaiste Simon Harris (Brian Lawless\/PA)<\/p>\n

Simon Harris is officially banning Fine Gael councillors from helping any Independent candidates get on the presidential election ticket.<\/p>\n

The dictate is a major blow to Independents becoming candidates via the council route.<\/p>\n

Among the Independents potentially seeking a council nomination are Bob Geldof, Maria Steen, Conor McGregor, Nick Delahunty and Gareth Sheridan.<\/p>\n

A candidate needs the backing of 20 Oireachtas members of four councils to be nominated.<\/p>\n

But Mr Harris’s party has instructed its councillors that if there is a vote to back an Independent they must “oppose that nomination”.<\/p>\n

Sinn Fein appears to be adopting a similar approach of not supporting Independent.<\/p>\n

And Fianna F\u00e1il may go down the same route.<\/p>\n

Councillors from these parties may rebel against instructions from the leadership but there are unlikely to be enough for candidates to get a majority of a council – let alone four.<\/p>\n

A candidate would need the backing of at councillors from at least two of the big parties on most councils to get on the ticket.<\/p>\n

Mr Harris’s senior official in party headquarters sent out the dictate yesterday.<\/p>\n

\"Tanaiste<\/p>\n

Tanaiste Simon Harris (Brian Lawless\/PA)<\/p>\n

Today’s News in 90 seconds – 6th September 2025 <\/p>\n

“Fine Gael public representatives cannot in any way facilitate the nomination of any candidate other than the ratified Fine Gael candidate.<\/p>\n

“In the event of a vote of any local authority on the nomination of a person other than the ratified Fine Gael candidate, the Fine Gael local authority members are whipped to oppose that nomination,” the email from party general secretary John Carroll said.<\/p>\n

The email said the decision had been taken by the Fine Gael ruling body “after considerable discussion and consultation” with party councillors.<\/p>\n

Fianna F\u00e1il and Sinn Fein have not yet issued an official instruction to councillors.<\/p>\n

Sinn Fein figures have said they are not opposed to Independents getting nominations – just not with the help of their councillors.<\/p>\n

Fianna F\u00e1il is also likely to encourage their councillors to stay away from helping independents.<\/p>\n

The process of independents going to councils seeking a nomination will start next week.<\/p>\n

In the last presidential election, 20 councils voted to nominate an independent candidate to be on the ticket.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BREAKING\u00a0|\u00a0 Tanaiste Simon Harris (Brian Lawless\/PA) Simon Harris is officially banning Fine Gael councillors from helping any Independent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3189,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3775,3774,42,43,978,70,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-3188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-fine-gael","tag-fionnan-sheahan","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-presidential-election","tag-simon-harris","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}