LIMERICK, a city of “heart, soul, and grit”, hosted the Labour Party’s 74th National Conference this past weekend.
Local TD Conor Sheehan welcomed members, councillors, deputies, and senators, as well as party leader Ivana Bacik to the first Labour conference in the Treaty City in 29 years.
The first-time TD, Deputy Sheehan said he was proud to follow in a long line of Limerick Labour TDs from Michael Keyes, Stephen Coughlan, Mick Lipper, Jim Kemmy, and Jan O’Sullivan.
Limerick, he told Labour members, has a lot of problems including “an overburdened health service, a drugs crisis that has ravaged working class communities, and a housing crisis that sees over 50 people rough sleeping every single night and leaves thousands of young adults stuck at home with their parents – if they haven’t emigrated”.
Deputy Sheehan told the conference that “Limerick needs more than the apathy this clapped-out gutless governing cobbled together by Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, and the Lowry and Western alliance”.
“That is why our job here is so important because Limerick needs Labour back in government.”
Introducing Labour leader Ivana Bacik to Limerick, Deputy Sheehan deemed it as “awe-inspiring” to work alongside her in Dáil Éireann.
Ms Bacik called for an “end to the politics of the past, represented by Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael – and the Lowry Lackeys.”
The “current of failure”, she opined, has no answers.
“This conservative coalition, cobbled together in three parts. Two civil war enemies uneasily united, relics of a bygone era. And the third leg, made up of the so-called Independents.
“What to say about them? They are also uneasily united by someone who truly represents the ghost of Christmas past, Michael Lowry,” she claimed.
The Labour leader went on to say that the “politics of the past” cannot offer hope to hard pressed households.
“What did this government do in the October Budget? They rewarded burger barons and big builders. Reckless tax cuts; massive giveaways to corporate chains. Nothing for working families.
“And that’s why we need an alternative politics. A programme for real change. To deliver the massive public investment needed. To improve lives, and support livelihoods. That’s the core message of our socialist and social democratic politics,” she concluded.