Carlow politicians lobbied left, right and centre
Organisations and politicians mentioned in the recent disclosures made on lobbying.ie
CARLOW politicians were collectively lobbied 257 times by the Irish Farmer’s Association in a four-month period, according to legally-mandated lobbying disclosures.
Deputy Peter Chap Cleere, who is a member of the Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture and Food, was lobbied 81 times, and deputy Natasha Newsome Drennan, another member of that committee, was lobbied 83 times. Deputy Catherine Callaghan was lobbied 75 times.
Many of these lobbying efforts related to measures to support farm enterprises. One such proposal was that the government should allocate a budget of €2m to initiate a pilot ‘spent mushroom compost’ scheme. The IFA emailed between 11 and 20 people, held meetings with two to five people and sent letters to all TDs as part of the lobbying campaign.
TD John McGuinness and minister of state Jennifer Murnane O’Connor were both lobbied once by the IFA. South-east MEP Cynthia Ní Mhurichiu was contacted by the IFA 16 times.
The IFA made a total of 159 returns during this period, many of which involved communications and meetings with multiple public officials and politicians.
The IFA was far from the only lobbying group to submit returns relating to Carlow officials. Carlow Chamber conducted four lobbying activities during this time. It held a meeting in Enterprise House with Peter Chap Cleere to discuss the needs of Carlow business, its pre-budget submission and ‘the need for greater speed in the rollout of housing and infrastructure’.
It also held regular meetings with Coilín O’Reily, chief executive of Carlow Co Council, “to discuss key issues facing the Carlow business community, to share information and to discuss areas of common interest”.
On 27 September, the chamber held a Fine Gael SME conference in SETU Carlow, attended by several TDs, former TDs and advisors. Deputy Callaghan attended alongside minister Peter Burke, Joe Neville TD and John Clendennen TD. The conference discussed the challenges facing small and medium businesses, the health sector and women in business.
Deputy Callaghan and deputy Newsome Drennan attended another Carlow chamber event, a ‘lobbying day’ to discuss the issues raised in the Chambers Ireland pre-budget submission.
Carlow College has lobbied various politicians 12 times in the past four years to advance its proposed integration with South-East Technological University (SETU). In the latest disclosure, it said that it sent between two and five letters to and from minister of state Murnane O'Connor and minister for higher education James Lawless regarding the college’s ‘strategic positioning’, requesting financial and political support for the move.
