Lovely Lorraine looking for local lift as Seanad sinks

We’re not sure what side of the Seanad referendum debate Athenry-based Senator Lorraine Higgins is on, but she inadvertently did a mighty job in favour of its abolition with a recent press release concerning matters so parochial that even your average county councillor would be reluctant to issue.

The subject matter – a broken lift at her local train station – is certainly an annoyance for users of the lift, particularly wheelchair users and elderly. We agree with Lorraine, it should be fixed, and shame on Irish Rail for leaving it ‘out of order’ for so long. But are broken lifts really what party leader Eamon Gilmore, the Tánaiste, had in mind for Lorraine when he appointed her to the upper house, a position that carries an annual salary of €60,000 plus expenses?

She even took time out of her, ahem, busy Seanad schedule to visit the broken lift and have her photograph taken beside it; a photograph that accompanied her emailed statement.

She never mentioned whether she had contacted Irish Rail about it but declared, with authority, that Junior Minister for Transport, Alan Kelly would be told: like a teacher’s threat to a pupil that they’ll be sent to the principal’s office if they don’t behave.

She kept her word . . . because the following week a missive arrived from Lorraine, this time with a photo of her and the Minister at said broken lift. She wanted the junior minister to see the broken lift “first hand” so that he could “put as much pressure as possible” on Irish Rail to fix it.

Again, Lorraine, in her second release, never mentioned if she’d actually asked Irish Rail to fix the lift before she threatened the company with ministerial action.

If she did and she’s been ignored, isn’t it a sad state of affairs that a senator and a junior minister have to get involved before a State-owned company will get the finger out and fix the lift.

But we digress from the real issue. One must bear in mind that Lorraine is the Labour Party’s Seanad Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs and Trade – what relevance does a lift in Athenry have to her brief as a senator?

Is it that the county councillors round Athenry aren’t pulling their weight or that Lorraine can’t find more weighty matters to occupy her time with that might actually convince the public that the sinking Seanad is worthy of saving?

For more, read this week's Connacht Sentinel.