To help you make an informed choice at the polling station on November 29th, 92.5 Phoenix FM will be speaking to many of the candidates from Dublin West to hear what their priorities are for the next Dáil. This series is adapted from our ‘General Election 2024’ podcast series as broadcasted on D15 Today, where you will find full-length interviews with the candidates.
Cllr Ruth Coppinger made a return to Fingal County Council after being re-elected for the Castleknock ward and is now making a bid for a Dáil comeback. “I think I have a good chance, I think especially with a five-seater, and I think people need a strong voice for workers, for women, for people who are facing discrimination. We already have the established and the establishment parties, so, you know, I’d be hopeful.”
Cllr Coppinger is officially standing for the Solidarity Party which has formed an electoral alliance with People Before Profit for the past number of years. “I don’t see a conflict between the two. I’m standing as part of the Solidarity-People Before Profit group in the Dáil, to try to provide a united socialist left alternative point of view, and people want to see unity. So, you know, we’ve come together in the last few elections.”
We have highlighted some of the main points raised in the interview.
On housing
Housing and the associated renting and buying crises are one of the key issues on voters’ mind going into this election, and Cllr Coppinger says that while the solution is “complex, it’s also very, very simple. We need to build public, affordable housing to resolve this. And Fingal County Council as the local council for most of Dublin West – I know Ashtown is obviously Dublin City Council – has the means at its disposal.”
Cllr Coppinger says she had to “embarrass the council” into developing the Churchfields land bank in 2017. Shortly after being re-elected to the council, Cllr Coppinger submitted a motion calling on Fingal County Council to develop a land bank in Dunsink that they later estimated had the potential to house 7,000 families (“They said that themselves. I actually thought it would be less”). All but one sitting councillor for Dublin 15 voted in support of this motion, so what is stopping the council from providing social housing?
“I think obviously there’s infrastructure that has to be put in, but I think it’s a mindset. I think that the local council – I’ve seen it since getting re-elected – just thinks of itself as providing a small number of social housing units for a small number of people. I was brought up in a council house and a housing estate. […] In decades past, a lot more people lived in social housing, they provided more. I think we have to get back to a situation where the state is intervening into this because it’s left completely now to vulture funds, investment funds and developers.”
“Myself and the councillors with Solidarity at the time highlighted [the Churchfields land bank] to the council back in 2016-2017. “Are you going to develop this? There’s a massive need in this area.” We are inundated. […] I know people with leukemia who are being evicted, people with cancer who are being evicted [from private rented accommodation] by landlords. I’ve had people who are suicidal messaging me from emergency accommodation. […] There’s so many ways for leaving me voice notes of desperation. And when you go into the council, there’s an air of complacency about all of this.”
Cllr Coppinger suggests there isn’t a real appetite for building housing “at pace” on the council. “We need people […] who are going to push on this issue and push relentlessly, because that hasn’t been happening on Fingal County Council in the way that it should have. Councilors have been happy enough to get 50 here, 50 there […]”
There is “totally” a lack of ambition on the council according to Cllr Coppinger. “I identified from the last budget document about €470 million in cash and liquid assets that [the council] could be using itself. You could build 2,000 houses with that. But it also has now a budget […] of over €1 billion in capital funding for housing for 3 years. […] The problem with it is, when you look at the breakdown, only about €100 million of that, just over 10% was going to be direct built council housing. The rest of it was going for acquisition, part 5s. These are all paid for at full whack, at full cost. People don’t seem to realise that.”
On public spending
The Apple tax windfall to the tune of €14 billion, which the outgoing government was involved in legal action for the global corporation not to be made liable for, has been the topic of discussion by opposition parties. Cllr Coppinger’s party has frequently outlined what it would do with this money if elected. She says that “we have this wealth, but it’s not being invested into the health service, into the housing system”. The National Children’s Hospital is an example of huge investment by the state that is not being spent “wisely”: “We’re not getting efficient return for an investment.”
Cllr Coppinger is one of several candidates in the area calling for universal healthcare: “That’s free at the point of use. You know, when you go to your GP, you know, having to pay for physio, OT, all of these things is completely wrong because it creates a huge inequality. […] If you’re spending money on agency nurses rather than recruiting staff nurses, that’s a huge problem. They tell me, for example, physio is being rationed at the hospital. Rationed, that word was used. So it’s affecting post-op care. It’s affecting outpatient appointments. You have to cut them. They can’t get therapists. We know this from the CDNT waiting list. One of the biggest issues in the election is the waiting list for children to be assessed for the assessment of needs.”
The housing crisis is only worsening the difficulties in recruitment according to Cllr Coppinger. “Unless they address the housing crisis and the cost of housing, they’re not going to be able to keep [graduates in Ireland]. I met a student nurse during the local election who told me everyone is leaving, as soon as they graduate. She used the phrase “Young Carpenterstown”, that is in Australia. So, it’s Generation Australia, Generation Box Room. We can’t get teachers in the local schools here. People, parents don’t realise just how much of an impact that’s having.”
On social issues
Cllr Coppinger is a self-described “socialist feminist”, and much of her work both within and outside of her role as a councillor and former TD has centred around reproductive rights and gender-based violence. In the wake of the October 7th attacks and the devastation that has followed in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon, she and her party colleagues including Blanchardstown-Mulhuddart Cllr John Burtchaell have staged many local protests calling for more action.
Cllr Coppinger believes the government is doing “a lot of talk” but not enough action. “Obviously, it recognised Palestine, very important symbolically but […] they’ve left [the Occupied Territories Bill] right until the last minute. That bill has been there for four years. They could have passed it earlier in the whole Dáil process. Now they’re rushing under pressure to be seen to be passing it.”
Coalition leader and Dublin West TD Roderic O’Gorman stated in October that it is “the Green Party’s position that Ireland shouldn’t be trading with the occupied territories and we want to see that position advanced in the remaining lifetime of this Government.” Last week however, the Minister claimed the Bill would need to be more “legally robust” before putting it to a Dáil vote.
“The problem with the Irish government is it says it supports the Palestinian cause […] but it’s not doing anything in terms of pressure on the US or the EU, which ultimately are funding, you know, the genocide that has taken place.” The use of the word “genocide” as in Cllr Coppinger’s case is a topic of contention: the International Court of Justice, while not ruling definitively on whether the term can apply, ultimately concluded that it was “plausible” that Israel’s actions had amounted to such and ordered the state to protect Palestinian citizens, orders which it has since repeatedly defied. One of Israel’s staunchest allies in Germany is setting the tone at EU level, where actions condemning the state have been few and far between.
In the aftermath of Russia’s war on Ukraine and now Israel’s assault on Gaza, the topic of neutrality has again come up for discussion. The government has participted in and opened up a number of conversations about joining military blocs like NATO, but Cllr Coppinger thinks “most people in Ireland favour neutrality, as in not joining [NATO]. I don’t think we should be part of military blocs. I want to see a peaceful world. […] It’s such a waste of money and resources, like look at the climate, the damage it’s doing.”
Pro-Palestinian activists have recently stayed protests outside Shannon Airport, where it has been revealed planes bound for Israel carrying weaponry have been stopping at in the past 12 months. Cllr Coppinger says that this defies the government’s claim of neutrality and that it has “always leaned toward Western imperialism, if you want to use that phrase. It’s very much beholden to the US and the EU in terms of everything that it does in its foreign policy. I think we saw that in relation to Russia and Ukraine, but now we’re not seeing the same action in terms of Palestine. […] I’d be in favour of us maintaining our neutrality and siding with the people who are facing oppression in the world.”
You can listen to our full interview with Cllr Coppinger on our ‘General Election 2024’ podcast series.
