Will Steen's slip lead to spoiled votes?

Last week I had never heard of a Hermes Kelly bag. I’m not sure my wife would take kindly to me spending €20,000 on such an accessory as a gift for her. Where did I get the money would be the first question!

But after Maria Steen sported one in a press conference at the front of Leinster House after failing to get on the Presidential ballot, it became the talk of the place in the immediate aftermath of her disappointment.

A big talking point in a dramatic day.

“Rarely has the political consensus seemed more oppressive or detached from the wishes and desires of the public,” she said.

Opponents leapt on the fact that she said this whilst holding such a ridiculously priced bag as evidence of how out of touch with the ordinary five-eighth she is herself.

Clearly Ms Steen is a woman of considerable means. From an affluent background, a successful barrister who became a stay-at-home mother, homeschools her children and is married to another successful barrister, there would have been no bank loan required for the Hermes bag.

To be honest, how she spends her vast amount of money is her business. More power to her if she wishes to have such a bag on her arm. But it was politically naïve to expect it not to draw unwanted attention to her in the current cost-of-living climate. And, ultimately, the late nature of her campaign and how it was run proved ruinous too.

This columnist wrote recently about my preference for Steen being on the ballot for diversity of thought in a nation where a considerable minority who are socially conservative are being more and more marginalised in society. I think it is important that such views are not dismissed with haste, even though they are not views I would share. Online, we see plenty of repugnant people who support Stein, seeing her as anti-establishment. It would be foolish to limit her potential support to such folk.

We are not that long gone from a dominant, traditional Catholic society, and there are plenty in our society, particularly the older generation, who have sincerely held traditional views, as referenced by the far from insignificant no votes in repeal and marriage equality referenda. Now whether they would all agree with Stein – whose views are extremely traditional – is another matter. But at least they would have a greater choice and not feel as disenfranchised now as many do.

Where this will all go remains to be seen. It is a three-horse race now but some supporters of Steen are not leaving it at that. There is a growing, right-wing campaign calling on people to spoil their vote by writing Steen’s name on the ballot.

Among those leading the charge is far-right Dublin City councillor Malachy Steenson, a man as far away from presidential as I can imagine. He has form for completely misinterpreting things, either willfully to stir up anger or out of complete stupidity.

After gangland figure Gerard Hutch outvoted him in Dublin Central in the last General Election, Steenson claimed the ‘establishment’ put Hutch into the race "to stop me and to stop the emerging nationalist movement". There’s conspiracy theories and there’s that.

Declan Ganley - a man with strong roots on Achill Island - is another leading the charge calling on people to spoil their votes.

Tweeting on X last Wednesday, he wrote: “No candidate considered ‘conservative’, ‘traditional’, anti the current establishment or indeed ‘pro-life’, was going to be allowed to get 20 nominations from the current Dáil and Senate. The cartel was simply not going to allow it to happen. There will be all sorts of opinions, ‘if only this had happened sooner/later’, ‘if only they’d chosen a different person to carry the message’ and so on and so forth. The shutters were pulled down many months ago. What do you think the ban on councillors nominating was about? The fix was in and there’s only one response to it that will count: #spoilthevote”.

It is further evidence of how people will either believe what they want to believe or twist the narrative to suit their own agendas because his claims are a load of nonsense.

Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael mandated their representatives to only nominate Jim Gavin and Heather Humphreys respectively. While I have expressed my doubts about the long-term impact of this, calling it a ‘fix’ and referring to them as a ‘cartel’ is extremely disingenuous. It is typical self-serving political behaviour that we have seen for decades, nothing more, nothing less.

But it is being manipulated and construed as anti-democratic in order to rally the mob. The reality is that the decision was quite democratic. The criteria for getting on the ticket is warranted to stop all sorts of headbangers from being allowed to stand. Conor McGregor anyone?

Perhaps Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael councillors could have abstained rather than voting against the likes of Steen and Gareth Sheridan once it was clear they were not time wasters. But perhaps if candidates had put in the hard work and properly canvassed those who had the say about them going on the ticket, they might have stood a better chance. The arrogance was breathtaking as is the victim playing now.

Steen did use intermediaries to make contact with members of the Oireachtas in the rushed last couple of weeks but it has become clear that the abrasive methods of those contacts saw people gravitate away from her rather than towards her. Perhaps personal approaches - easier done if she had started her campaign sooner - might have earned a greater return.

The most curious aspect is Michael McDowell’s refusal to vote for Steen after working hand in hand with her last year in the ‘No No’ campaign in the family and care referenda.

John McGuirk is the editor of right-wing website Gript, who often decries a ‘biased media’ even though no platform is as biased to one side of the political spectrum as his website is. Clearly a fan of Steen, he concluded that McDowell refused to back her because of some petty jealousy.

Perhaps. Until McDowell speaks, we won’t know. Pat Leahy wrote a much more measured assessment in The Irish Times, a paper for which McDowell writes a column, and therefore, you might assume, Leahy has some insight into McDowell’s thinking.

As per Leahy, Steen started off with no designs on winning, merely competing and offering an alternative voice but as the wider field became more and more underwhelming, there was a growing sense Steen had a real shout. There was a wide enough base behind her - pro-lifers, broad social conservatives, anti-government supporters and people who were moving into the right-wing.

“McDowell had worked with Steen previously and had a high regard for her abilities. But he had profound political differences with her and did not want to see her as President. He resolved not to nominate her, and did not engage with efforts to persuade him,” wrote Leahy.

The wailing online from the broad right is perhaps understandable - they thought she could win too and would have seen it as a massive victory.

Now whether she would have won is debatable. We will just never know.

But ultimately it would appear that her hardline form of social conservatism was just too much of a pill for enough members of the Oireachtas to swallow. Or her campaign was far too late getting underway. And the opposition of the main parties played a part, unsurprisingly. All of these things can be true when only two votes were the difference.

I’m not sure the rest of the campaign will be as exciting.