Harris defends party leader
Tánaiste Leo Varadkar’s Cabinet colleagues have defended his attendance at a music festival in London at the weekend.
Controversy erupted after a photograph emerged showing Minister Varadkar at the Mighty Hoopla music festival in London last Saturday while the live entertainment sector remained in lockdown here.
There has been much criticism, especially since industry heads have long since been advocating for the staging of similar-type events here. Minister Varadkar has denied any wrong doing, saying he complied with restrictions.
Minister for Further and Higher Education, Simon Harris, was visiting Cavan on Monday. He denied his party leader’s attendance at the UK festival was tone deaf to concerns of those back home.
Referring to the fact the Tánaiste had met with British counterpart, Michael Gove, and he is preparing to lead the first in-person Enterprise Ireland trade mission onto Paris and Berlin since the pandemic hit, Minister Harris said his Minister Varadkar has an “extraordinarily busy” week ahead.
“I don’t need to tell anyone here in a Border county like Cavan or Monaghan how important it is that we get back to those trade missions, in the context of Brexit and rebuilding after Covid.”
When photographed, Minister Varadkar had been enjoying some “down time”, noted Minister Harris.“I think everyone is entitled to a day off and a bit of down time, even the Tánaiste of our country.”
Cavan-Monaghan TD, and Minister for Social Protection, Heather Humphreys, also rowed in behind her leader. “He started [in London] a day earlier, and he attended a concert, and I think to be fair to the man, like everyone else, he’s entitled to some private time.”
Sending the wrong Signal?
Minister Humphreys also clarified her use of an encrypted messaging app in which text conversations, images, videos and voice notes can be made to disappear.
The use of the Signal app by senior Government figures hit headlines last week after Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney was found to have deleted text messages relating to the appointment of Katherine Zappone as UN Special Envoy back in July.
Five ministers - Stephen Donnelly, Heather Humphreys, Paschal Donohoe, Eamon Ryan and Roderic O’Gorman - are all confirmed to have accounts with the messaging service.
“I have Signal on my phone but I don’t use Signal messaging to conduct Government business,” Minister Humphreys informed The Anglo-Celt when asked.
“I’m not a big texter myself, I usually like to make a phonecall, or face-to-face, because sometimes text messages can appear something slightly different than you mean.”