Mayor of Waterford City and County, Seamus Ryan said he was “a little bit fed up” with the debate around the council’s St Patrick’s Day trip to Boston, USA.
The Mayor was speaking at the Council’s Plenary meeting for April following a debate about Waterford Council sending a delegation to represent the County in the US.
Councillors are generally limited the two minutes a month of speaking time across a few sections of the Plenary meeting, such as Matters Arising and Manager’s Report.
In March, Fine Gael’s Lola O’Sullivan demanded that John Hearne apologise for a post he made on social media regarding the cost of the St Patrick’s Day trip.
During the April Plenary, Cllr O’Sullivan said she was correct to call Cllr Hearne’s post ‘fake news’ and said those who entered the draw to go on the Boston trip should be made public so everyone would know which parties were involved.
It was confirmed in March that members from Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, and Sinn Féin had entered the draw, although this had since been disputed.
“The best way to put this to bed is that we list the people that were in that draw,” said Mayor Ryan.
This was resisted by Cllr. Joe O’Riordan, who asked “we are not going to name names are we? Just party groups. It’s an infringement of GDPR.”
This comment drew smiles, objections, and calls along the lines of “go way out of that.”
Cllr O’Riordan was overruled. The Councillors who entered the draw for the Boston trip were named as: Joe Kelly (Ind), John O’Leary (FF), Pat Nugent (FG), Kate O’Mahoney (SF), Declan Barry (Ind), John Pratt (Lab), Joe O’Riordan (Ind), Declan Clune (Ind), Lola O’Sullivan (FG), Frank Quinlan (FG), Adam Wyse (FF), Niamh O‘Donovan (FG), Thomas Phelan (Lab), Blaise Hannigan (Ind), and Jason Murphy (FF).
This means that all parties with more than one elected member were represented in the draw, along with more than half the independents.
Two more unnamed Councillors had initially applied but withdrew due to scheduling conflicts.
A full breakdown of the cost of the Council’s St Patrick’s Day Visit to Boston is available on page 7.
AARON KENT
Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme
