Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore has dismissed any suggestions that his leadership of the Labour Party is an issue following its very poor showing in the Meath East byelection.
Labour candidate Eoin Holmes received only 4.5 per cent of the vote and finised in fifth place. This compared to the 21 per cent taken by Labour in the constituency in the 2011 general election. In contrast to Labour, Fianna Fáil enjoyed an encouraging result, with 32.5 per cent of the vote, far better than its 19 per cent showing in 2011.
"I'm disappointed with the result. It was a bad result for the Labour Party. It is a result that I intend to address. It's not something we are going to ignore," Mr Gilmore said in his first public response to the poll.
He said the party needed to do some reflection, look at the implications and consider what it needed to do in the future. He said it would begin that process immediately but would not be drawn on whether or not any meeting of the party will be convened during Easter Week, when the Dáil and Seanad are in recess.
He said that people did understand that Labour had to make some very difficult decisions to make the economy turn around.
"I think they acknowledge we have made progress but of course it has not penetrated and it has not been reflected in people's lives and living standards, people who are still struggling with meeting mortgages, people who have not jobs," he said.
"The challenge in the period ahead will be to convert the work we have done in building a foundation for recovery into a real impact on people's lives."
He repeated that it had not been a good result for the Labour Party. "I don't intend to ignore it or what we have heard from people in Meath."
He said it was now the responsibility of the party leadership to face into a challenge just as the Government had tackled the economic crisis.
Asked was his leadership of the party now on the table, he replied: "No it's not. Leadership is about facing up and facing problems just as we faced up to the economic problem."
When specific questions were put about him moving from the Department of Foreign Affairs to another portfolio, or of a review of the Programme for Government, he responded by saying: "Today is just the day after the election, I don't think it's a day for making decisions on any one issue. We will reflect on the result. We will consider it and we will make whatever decisions [we need to make]."
There was a considerable level of shock among members of the Labour parliamentary party at the outcome of the byelection. One Labour Minister of State privately told colleagues yesterday that he had lost confidence in Eamon Gilmore’s leadership. Another TD, a backbencher who has been critical of the leader in the past, said the same mistakes had been made in the byelection that had been made in the general election.
