Micheál Martin belatedly becomes Irish leader after parliamentary chaos

Micheál Martin has been appointed Ireland’s prime minister a day later than planned after a chaotic 24 hours in Dáil Éireann, the lower house of the Irish parliament.

The Fianna Fáil leader was due to be elected as taoiseach for a second time in his career on Wednesday, but parliament was suspended several times because of a bitter row between the government and opposition parties in which each accused the other of undermining democracy.

The opposition had rejected a move to temporarily allow a group of government-supporting independents to sit on the opposition benches and use up speaking time. The government said the opposition was disrupting the election of a taoiseach.

As a result, when Martin was supposed to be meeting the president he was instead claiming the constitution had been subverted. Now he is belatedly in office again.

On Wednesday morning the Dáil speaker, Verona Murphy, said she would allow the government-supporting independents – the Regional Independent Group – to “provisionally” take their seats on the opposition benches until a final decision was made.

This sparked a day-long row in which the Dáil was suspended twice before being abandoned completely after a third attempt to press on with electing Martin.

The argument centred around four government-supporting independents who wanted to remain in a technical group with two other independent members.

To keep the technical group status, the members must be in opposition under Dáil rules.

This status would afford them more speaking rights – such as debating legislation and asking questions – than lone wolves. The Regional Independent Group would essentially be able to reap the benefits of being both in the government and outside of it.

The counterargument to this is that since the group do not hold ministerial positions, they’re not really in government at all despite their role as kingmakers.

It’s clear the ambiguity over technical groups needs to be cleared up, constitutional expert Dr Jennifer Kavanagh told RTÉ’s Prime Time. That could be as simple as ending the requirement for technical groups to be in opposition.

“You can’t run with the hare and hunt with the hounds,” Kavanagh said. “You are either in government or you are in opposition.”

So was the government trying to undermine opposition parties, as some claimed? It’s more “cock-up than conspiracy”, public affairs consultant Gerard Howlin told Prime Time.

The heat died down on Thursday morning after the speaker said the Regional Independent Group would not have opposition speaking rights after all, pending a final decision.

That same day Micheál Martin was appointed taoiseach for the second time. He will hand over to his coalition partner and Fine Gael counterpart Simon Harris in 2027.