Enda’s 'poster girl’ out to prove she can add substance to style
by Joan Duignan Updated: Wednesday, 16th February, 2011 4:47pm
Fine Gael Leader Enda Kenny TD on the campaign trail with Meath West candidate Cathering Yore.
“The new politics” is a topic Meath West Fine Gael candidate Catherine Yore is passionate about and the 26 years-old Meath County Councillor from Carnaross seems to personify the idea in her conversation about changes needed in the system and in her youthful, energetic appearance.
People on the doorsteps are saying it’s time to “cut out the lies” and she believes disillusioned voters want integrity and transparancy in politics. They also want “positivity”. She finds hope has faded for people; they need the belief again that Ireland “is a great little nation”. She is convinced that recovery will happen but it will take time.
The Meath West candidate, most recently described nationally as “the very pretty girl seen at Enda Kenny’s side”, says she is quite self-conscious about this concentration on her appearance. She has passionately-held beliefs and claims to “say it as it is.” Irish people take pride in artistic and sporting achievement. “I want to restore pride in politics,” she adds.
Cllr Yore became active in the Carnaross branch of Fine Gael and decided she wanted to do things. Politics came knocking on her door in the 2002 general election in the form of FG candidate, Damien English, who listened to her and her sisters. She had also been inspired by the 'Michael Collins’ film when aged 11 or 12.
As a primary school teacher, specialising for the past year in learning support in Whitecross National School, Julianstown, one concern is that there are some junior infants coming in with poor ability to express themselves. Great as the hi-tech era is, social interaction remains essential, she says. For children with special needs, supports must be there to guide them through the extra-stressful transition into second-level school.
As regards government-promised upgrading of Meath schools and provision of two new secondary schools (in Ashbourne and Navan), she hopes these necessary developments go ahead. “We must look properly at our demographics,” she adds, explaining that a strategy for school development is needed so that it is about demographics, not politics. Ireland also has to get its finances right, she says, but observes that, in Germany, even during recession, education was not cut.
Wastage within the political system is another key concern. Cllr Yore says she is flabbergasted at the extras TDs obtain. FG is saying TDs cannot take a pension until pension age and ministerial cars must be pooled, the number of deputies reduced and the Senate abolished (subject to a referendum).
She is also upset at rising suicide figures, clearly linked to people being in crisis with high levels of personal debt, not alone negative equity, due to the economic climate. She says her party’s health policies recognise the prevalence and tragedy of suicide. To her knowledge, there is only one designated public hospital bed for anorexia or bulimia sufferers currently.
Were it not for Our Lady’s Hospital, Navan, her father, John Yore, would have died in September 2009 in the ambulance on the way from his job at Wellman International, Mullagh, after he suffered a heart attack. If he had to go to hospital in Drogheda, he would not have survived so the retention of Navan Hospital is an issue she is passionate about. She also points out how many jobs it provides, apart from direct medical personel.
From a small farm background, where sucklers and sheep are the mainstay, Cllr Yore believes the importance of agriculture and tourism was neglected in the building boom years. She has found that a quarter of the world’s baby-food is Irish-made. The food manufacturing side of agriculture needs development, she says, and Ireland has plenty of qualified people such as food technicians - but now jobs for them must be provided.
Without such refocusing, young Irish people, including many highly-qualified friends she has visited in Sydney, will not return to this country, like the lost generations of the '50s and '60s. She says this is the issue which brought her into politics, adding that she wants the country restored, both for those who have left and for the children who sit in front of her in class.
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