Migration was the main issue as some straight-shooters emerged from the pack
The most memorable things from the Midland North West debate on RTÉ in 2019 were the exchanges between Casey and McHugh. Five years later, they were both positioned beside each other again in the debate, even though Casey was closer to McHugh’s podium than his own at times. She was the person who called Casey out when he said he had been a migrant in three different countries legally.
Most of the candidates skirted around the questions without answering them directly. Peter Casey was asked if he was standing in the presidential election and replied: “At the moment, I’m going to commit totally to Europe.” It was that kind of a night. Flanagan was successful in another age-old ploy of interjecting loudly when his opponents spoke, and then objecting loudly when others interjected against him.
Another straight-shooter was Pauline O’Reilly – who was also the most unflappable of the eight. She managed to distinguish herself from the pure idealism of the former Green, McHugh. O’Reilly argued that the Green Party will always opt to be in Government, even if it can’t achieve everything it sets out to do. She asserted that if you have a vision you need to take action, and on issues like climate change and biodiversity, you can’t wait.
Tóibín has long called for a “mature debate” on migration and has argued that the current system for dealing with asylum seekers is not fit for purpose. He interjected often, and repeated a message that Ireland was ceding too much sovereignty to the EU on migration, defence policy and agriculture. If you were to rank support for the EU, there were three pro-Europe candidates in Monday night’s debate; four candidates who were not the EU’s greatest fans; and one, Flanagan, who was half sceptic, half flag-waver. There are another 19 candidates in the constituency for voters to consider before they cast their ballots on June 7th.
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