The government is poised to easily defeat Sinn Féin’s no-confidence vote later tonight after two stray Green Party TDs got back on board.
easa Hourigan and Patrick Costello — who previously lost the whip in May for voting in favor of a Sinn Féin motion — will vote against the motion with their Coalition colleagues, sources said.
The couple supported a Sinn Féin motion calling for the construction of the new national maternity hospital on public land, but will now oppose another Sinn Féin motion that, if passed, would topple the government.
With other assurances obtained from whipless Fine Gael TD Joe McHugh, who opposed government legislation on Mica’s compensation, and the Independents, it is now virtually unimaginable that the coalition will lose.
The Taoiseach taunted this lunchtime opponents in the Dáil over the matter, notably warning People Before Profit TDs that it was only a matter of time before they would be included in Sinn Féin.