Understanding the Elections
Posted on 13. Feb, 2020, in Community, Faith and Justice, Gospel Values, PoliticiansComments Off on Understanding the Elections
The success of Sinn Féin in the last elections changed the political landscape of Ireland. It was unexpected, arguably even to the party themselves and left many wondering what was going on.
Kevin Hargaden is a theologian with the Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice in Dublin. His is the author of Theological Ethics in a Neoliberal Age, published by Wipf and Stock. He talks about how it came down to Sinn Féin’s coherent policy around housing and how Eoin Ó Brion, Sinn Féin’s spokesperson on housing made the most credible case of all the parties around solutions.
Kevin also added that Sinn Féin’s success should not eclipse the success of the Green Party, who achieved a six fold increase in the number of seats going from two to twelve. He said that a good result from this election would be a government who tackled the housing crisis with environmentally friendly solutions, helping to solve two problems simultaneously. Kevin also noted that Peter McVerry had long being saying that a government who continued to ignored the housing crisis did so at their peril and he feels that even if Sinn Féin don’t get into power, they will have at least woken any government up to the fact that housing needs to be a top priority.