The Green Party has voted in favour of a motion requesting that Lord Mayor of Dublin Hazel Chu temporarily step aside as party chair.
Ms Chu sparked controversy after she announced her intention to run in the Seanad by-election without the backing of the party. This resulted in a number of members lodging a motion of no confidence in her, which was later withdrawn.
The motion, which passed by 11 votes to five at a meeting of the parliamentary party this evening, asks that Ms Chu stand down as party chair for the duration of the by-election. The Irish Examiner reports that Green Party deputy leader Catherine Martin urged members not to press ahead with the motion and said the deepening divisions within the party must end.
However, other members of the party argued that the vote should go ahead.
Ms Chu, a councillor in Dublin City, submitted her nomination for the Industrial and Commercial Panel in the upcoming Seanad by-election last week.
That decision angered some in the leadership and three Green Party senators — Pippa Hackett, Róisín Garvey, and Pauline O'Reilly — tabled a motion of no confidence in her chairing of the party.
That motion was replaced with one that passed which asked that “the Oireachtas Parliamentary Party requests that the Party’s Chairperson steps aside from the duties/roles associated with being Chairperson for the duration of the Seanad election process”.
