Ring commits to ’Team FG’

Ring commits to ‘Team FG’

Michael Duffy

HE’S never been afraid of criticising his own party, but with the Fine Gael/Labour coalition edging closer to the current Coalition at the weekend in the Sunday Business Post Election Poll, even Michael Ring can see the benefits of toeing the party line.
Ring officially launched his own campaign last Friday in the Westport Plaza Hotel and one of the country’s top vote-getters declared he is prepared to ‘give up’ some of his areas to increase the chances of his party securing three seats in the leader’s constituency.
Back in September, after the first polls indicted that a third seat for Fine Gael was a possibility, depending on transfers, Michael Ring told The Mayo News that it was ‘every man for himself’ and that he ‘hoped the other candidates won’t be expecting me to get them elected’.
However, last Friday morning Michael Ring was espousing the benefits of the ‘Team Fine Gael’ approach. He was playing the captain’s part and in true ebullient Ring style, he didn’t rule out the possibility of Fine Gael winning four seats.
“This is a team effort, all my literature will have the four candidates’ names on them. This is not the Michael Ring team, this is the Fine Gael team. We have to work as a team,” said the Westport-based deputy, who also made it clear that his own seat was not safe.
“The reality is I have never got the quota in any of the elections I have run in, it took me five counts to get elected. There is only one safe seat in the Dáil and that is the Ceann Comhairle’s.”