TD Paul Murphy has claimed that six gardai at Tallaght Garda Station are currently trying to ‘pin charges’ on those involved in protests which saw the Tanaiste trapped in her car for over two hours.

Mr Murphy was speaking to Sean O’Rourke on RTE Radio One this morning, when he claimed that six officers in Tallaght Garda Station were working on the protest.

“There’s apparently six gardai working full time in Tallaght trying to find charges to pin on people, in particular on me, in a way to damage to anti-water protesters. Let’s see the charges”

He added that Joan Burton’s comments referring to the protesters at the event as ‘fascists’ were designed to deflect from an opinion poll in the Sunday Independent which showed Labour support continuing to slide.

“The rhetoric is being escalated by the government. She gave this embargoed interview when she would have known about the opinion poll coming out.

“It’s laughable to describe it as fascism.

“She’s entitled to go to the guards, she’s entitled to make a complaint if she believes she was falsely imprisoned.” he said.

One person has so far been charged in relation to the incident.

He also defended comments he made in a video obtained by Independent.ie in which he said he was elected to break the law:

“I think it’s self evidentially true to be honest. I stood on a platform of civil disobedience, on calling on people to boycott the water charges on mass.”

He then questioned how the video in which he made the comments was leaked to Independent.ie

“The real question is how that video was leaked. The aim of the video which was leaked apparently to the Independent was to damage the protesters. There is one man behind the Independent and one man behind GMC Sierra and questions have to be asked”, he said.

However presenter Sean O’Rourke said:

"I think Denis O’Brien probably has better things to be doing with his time than sending lads around with video cameras".

Online Editors