Fine Gael - Bruton Sacked

Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny has sacked Richard Bruton as the party's finance spokesman and deputy leader.

The Fine Gael leader is set to confirm his sacking of Mr Bruton from his positions at 5.30pm. It is understood Mr Kenny will put down motion of confidence in himself at tomorrow’s front bench meeting.

Over the weekend, Mr Bruton had phoned members of the party’s front bench to sound out levels of support for his leadership bid against Mr Kenny.

Senior Fine Gael figures today called for party unity and urged critics of Mr Kenny to “pull back” ahead of an expected challenge to his leadership.

Mr Kenny has insisted he would lead the party into the next general election. Events are expected to come to a head when the front bench holds its weekly meeting tomorrow morning.

Speaking this morning, Mr Bruton said the party's view would prevail in the matter. "What I'm saying is that I'm not commenting to the media about discussions I intend to have with parliamentary colleagues," he said.

"I think the party needs to do serious thinking about its future, and that should be done with party colleagues and not through the media. . . . we're an open, democratic party, we need to talk to each other about our difficulties, and that's what I intend to do."

The party's finance spokesman refused to be drawn on whether or not he supported Mr Kenny. "We [the party] have serious difficulties that we have to address and we have to decide how that is to be addressed," he said, adding he had had spoken to Mr Kenny.

Transport spokesman Fergus O'Dowd is the only one of the 17 frontbenchers to so far publicly pledge their support to Mr Bruton in the event of a leadership contest.

Speaking this morning, Fine Gael chief whip Paul Kehoe said nobody in the party wanted a leadership bid and appealed to Mr Bruton to avoid such an action.

"You will have times when people get a little bit shaky, but this is not the time to have any sort of a leadership battle . . . if there were people wanting this, I'm sure they would have been out over the last number of days," he told RTÉ Radio.

Mr Kehoe said he didn't know what Mr Bruton was planning and refused to be drawn on numbers behind any leadership heave.

"I'm sure that Enda Kenny will overcome any leadership challenge because he has the respect . . . Enda Kenny has had many electoral contests over the last number of years and he is proven in that . . . and there's only one poll at the end of the day, and that's in the local election, the European election, or the general election."

Asked what he would say to Mr Bruton, Mr Kehoe responded: "I would be saying: 'Richard, look deep into your heart, this party is bigger than one person. We have to hold this party for future generations, and if what has been talked about will happen, I assure you the party will go back and undo the great work Enda Kenny has done over the past eight years."'

He said the timing of any motion of no-confidence in Mr Kenny would be decided by party chairman Padraic McCormack.

Mr Kenny’s leadership was endorsed publicly yesterday by Mr Kehoe and fellow frontbenchers Phil Hogan, Alan Shatter, Dr James Reilly, Charlie Flanagan, Jimmy Deenihan, Michael Ring and Senator Frances Fitzgerald.

Another frontbencher, Simon Coveney, issued a statement through the Fine Gael press office that called for party unity. Leo Varadkar expressed support as recently as the weekend, but had no comment to make yesterday.

Mr Hogan this morning said it was ironic the party was debating its leadership when the Taoiseach was facing a motion of confidence. "I suppose it would only be Fine Gael that would achieve that," he said, adding the party was a "laughing stock" due to the timing of the leadership debate.

The frontbencher said the people behind the leadership bid would have to come under scrutiny for their judgment and "political naivety".

Asked if he thought Mr Bruton should be fired from the front bench, the environment spokesman said that was an issue for his party leader. "My own view is that Mr Kenny needs a strong, cohesive, solid team behind him that are loyal to the party and are disciplined . . . the message we're sending out to the general public is that you shouldn't be put in charge of a septic tank, rather than be put in charge of the economy, if you're going to be wobbling on the basis of one poll."

Mr Hogan told Today with Pat Kenny Mr Bruton had an obligation to pull back on his decision and urged him to remember the consequences of the 2001 heave when his brother John faced a similar situation.

"Remember, everybody in the parliamentary party had a problem with John Bruton at the time, and he became an excellent taoiseach, so there are a lot of lessons that obviously some people have not learned from the past."

Conceding "the genie was out of the bottle", Mr Hogan called for sanity at the frontbench meeting tomorrow, adding that to change leaders on the basis of an opinion poll would be "absolute lunacy".

Mayo TD Mr Ring also backed his party leader this morning. "We've had 20 wonderful polls over the last number of years . . . we've had two bad polls, we have to hold our nerve," he told RTÉ. "We have Fianna Fáil on the ropes, and really our target should be Fianna Fáil and to replace this Government as quickly as possible."

Meath TD Shane McEntee said Mr Kenny was in a very strong position with support of 90 per cent of the party. "The people who might be talking about it should either do it out in the open or not do it at all . . . and I think the few people who have been beating around the bush for the last couple of weeks should either put up or shut up."

Sligo-based TD John Perry said he was disappointed to hear of a leadership challenge and called on Mr Kenny to assert his leadership and control of the party "very decisively".

Cavan/Monaghan TD Seymour Crawford also called for unity. "We should go forward as a united party under Enda Kenny and maximise the vote to remove Fianna Fáil from power at the earliest possible date,” Mr Crawford said. His call for unity was echoed by Donegal TD Dinny McGinley and Clare TD Joe Carey, and North West MEP Jim Higgins.

Commenting this afternoon, Sean Kelly MEP said: “No divided team ever won an All Ireland title. Unity of purpose is absolutely key on both the football pitch and in political circles.

“I am calling on my party colleagues to show that necessary unity of purpose now and row in behind the most successful leader of Fine Gael for decades."

Fine Gael members were unsettled by the Irish Times /Ipsos MRBI opinion poll last week, showing Fine Gael in second place to Labour and Mr Kenny’s personal rating down seven points to 24 per cent. A number of party figures who currently support Mr Kenny said his position as leader would have to be looked at again if polls continued to show poor results.

Tomorrow's Government’s motion of confidence in Taoiseach Brian Cowen follows Mr Kenny’s decision to propose a motion of no confidence in Mr Cowen late last Wednesday night, after reading the reports into the causes of the banking crisis by Central Bank governor Patrick Honohan and international banking experts Klaus Regling and Max Watson.

A Fine Gael spokesman said the precise timing of the front bench meeting tomorrow had yet to be decided.