Bruton dismisses secret poll in favour of leadership change

Fine Gael has made its decision on the party leadership, and the poll taken in the party room is the only poll that counts, the…

Fine Gael has made its decision on the party leadership, and the poll taken in the party room is the only poll that counts, the Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, has told The Irish Times.

Mr Bruton was responding to a report in The Irish Times which said a secret poll, privately commissioned by an individual and backed by a small group of party supporters who wanted to see Mr Bruton ousted, showed an alliance involving Fine Gael, Labour and smaller parties would receive considerably more support if Mr Bruton was replaced as leader.

In the poll, some 42 per cent said they would vote for such an alliance led by Mr Bruton, while 47 per cent said they would support the same alliance if Fine Gael were no longer led by him.

"As far as I'm concerned, the party has decided on its approach," he said.

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Mr Bruton was taking part in a question-and-answer session at a FG women's conference at the weekend, where he said the past week has shown Fine Gael was a party capable of making tough decisions and taking decisive action.

"Austin Deasy was decisive in what he did. And the party was decisive. This is in contrast with the present government," said Mr Bruton. Responding to questions, he said he would, in government, rebuild the health system, which was a two-tier system and was not working and had been engaged in "crisis management from day to day".

The party would this week introduce a radical health plan, which would, among other things, strengthen the role of pharmacists in the health system, change the management structures in hospitals and have a system where everyone would be insured and treated equally.

A lot more effort had to be put into preventive medicine, said Mr Bruton, something the party's health plan would go into in greater detail.

On the current taxi crisis, Mr Bruton said the Government should have moved decisively on deregulation. It was the courts which were in charge, not Fianna Fail, he said. Fine Gael supported deregulation of the taxi industry.

He said stability was s the most important thing in government. "People have got to know who is No 1 and who is No 2." Anything else was completely against the interests of the country, he said.