*Deputy Violet-Anne Wynne (IND) and Cllr Donna McGettigan (SF). Photograph: Joe Buckley
Clare TD, Violet-Anne Wynne (IND) has revealed a snub from Mary Lou McDonald (SF) was the “straw the broke the camel’s back” leading to her exit from Sinn Féin.
Late on Thursday night, the Kilrush woman sent political shockwaves across the county and further afield by announcing she had not renewed her membership of Sinn Féin citing a campaign of “psychological warfare”.
Deputy Wynne joined Sinn Féin in 2012, one year after moving to Co Clare. The Offaly native was elected to Dáil Éireann in the 2020 General Election becoming the county’s third ever female TD. She will continue to represent the constituency of Clare but as an Independent TD.
A “culmination of local issues” specifically collaboration and communication were among her main reasons for leaving the party. She said appeals for information to be fed back to her from different cumanns across the county were ignored which she responded to by emailing the party membership “on a consistent basis” to keep them informed and help build up relations.
Staffing was a big bone of contention with Wynne having three parliamentary assistants during her two years as a TD, the first PA was not hired until July 2020, “I was one of the last TDs to get a parliamentary assistant,” she recalled. She had no input into the hiring of this person with the interview process completed by party officials, the two appointed individuals then took sick leave for six months, both leaving on the same day, this created a dispute which required Violet-Anne to involve an employee rights lawyer.
Frustration was also experienced with the opening of her constituency office in Parnell St which had “a considerable delay”. She recounted, “I wouldn’t have had much support around that”, the mother of six then stopped herself from continuing, “I would love to go into more detail but I will take time to consider how I release that information, all I can say is I was on my own in the whole process in the setting up of the office”.
Mary Lou McDonald made no contact with Deputy Wynne following the birth of her sixth child, Collins, a story which received national attention as the birth took place in an ambulance outside Kilrush Golf Club. “It was the straw that broke the camel’s back, I thought it was such an easy and normal thing to do,” Violet-Anne said of Mary Lou’s inability to congratulate her on the baby’s arrival.
Her ongoing difficulties at local level could have been aided by a simple message from Mary Lou, she felt. “It really put things into perspective, the party came out with a statement saying they were working hard on local issues but if the leadership wanted to send a message that she did support and was fully behind me, the common decency was to acknowledge Collins’ birth, I was not looking for something grandiose but just a phone call or text message, that is camaraderie and I would think is common place within party, it would have really helped the situation”.
“It confirmed the feeling I had been having, I mentioned gas lighting in my statement, those comments confirmed what I felt and that was of being not wanted and hoping I would eventually give up,” she told The Clare Echo.
A gift did arrive from Mary Lou to mark the birth but only after it became known the Tánaiste, Leo Varadkar (FG) sent a letter to Kilrush congratulating Violet-Anne and her partner John on their new arrival.
She felt that local members did not want her to contest the next General Election whereas she appreciated the constant support from fellow TDs. “Locally the issues already there before the election continued to get worse with various disagreements going on”.
Like Mary Lou, Cllr Donna McGettigan (SF) has also not been in touch with Deputy Wynne since her announcement. Violet-Anne said her relationship with Donna changed after her election to the Dáil. “I don’t know who is the cause of it but the organisation did not help in anyway, an awful lot was said with the information not being direct, if there was issues or difficulties, people were not picking up the phone and ringing me direct, it was like Chinese whispers and I have a feeling it was made worse each time”.
Deputy Wynne also expressed disappointment with comments from Chairman of the Ennis SF Cumann, Thomas Guilfoyle when speaking on Clare FM’s Morning Focus. “There was strong implications in what they are saying and I will be gathering myself to refute those implications and what they alluded to on teamwork and working within the team in Sinn Féin”.
Speaking to The Clare Echo, Cllr McGettigan confirmed that she has not spoken to Deputy Wynne but wished her well. “Any issues we were made aware of locally and nationally, we tried to resolve them. I won’t get into the ins and outs because a he said she said won’t do anyone any good”. She said the decision came as a surprise and flagged that her focus at the time was on preparing for the funeral of party member Margaret O’Connor.
She wished not to discuss the claims of problems at local level within the party, “I don’t want to get into it because it will be only for a tit for tat. We need to move on and wish her all the best”. When asked if the TD ever reached out to her for help during the difficulties, Donna replied, “the issues came forward and we tried to resolve them”.
Donna did not believe the actions towards Violet-Anne were part of a wider party effort to clean up its act before it returns to the polls. She said she hasn’t thought about putting her own name forward to contest the next General Election for Sinn Féin, “You wouldn’t believe the amount of people that have asked me about it, I love the local stuff and being in the community and working with the groups, I work hard with the groups and I love my town of Shannon, time will tell. I haven’t really thought about it, my sole attention was keeping Mike McKee’s seat and my sole attention is to retain that seat”.
Prior to the 2020 General Election, Ballyvaughan native Noeleen Moran cited difficulties within the party when withdrawing her name, Donna did not believe this strengthened the assertions of worrying internal conflict towards women in Sinn Féin. “Every party has problems, I won’t say we don’t have problems, I think sometimes people can whip up a storm when there isn’t a storm, it was unfortunate Noeleen took her name out of the running, you never know she could have been a TD”.
