Meeting at the Mansion House

I traveled up to Dublin's Mansion House at the weekend for a Labour Councillor's meeting which started off with a coffee and a chat with Party Leader Eamon Gilmore TD.

Eamon and I discussed Westport and Mayo and how the Labour Party was building on old roots as Mayo was once a power base for Labour with TD and former Labour Party Leader elected from the county in 1927.

Thomas J. O'Connell (21 November 1882 – 22 June 1969) was an Irish trade unionist and politician, and was leader of the Irish Labour Party from 1927 to 1932. O'Connell was born near Knock, County Mayo. From 1902 to 1916 he worked first as a national teacher and then as a school principal. In 1926 he became general secretary of the Irish National Teachers' Organisation. In the June 1927 election he stood instead in the new five-seat Mayo South constituency, where he topped the poll, and he was re-elected at the September 1927 election.

Eamon will be coming to Westport this year as part of his tour of the constituencies and as a West of Ireland man he is well aware of the needs of Mayo for infrastructure, broadband and investment by the IDA.