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27th Oct 2018

Peter Casey explains why he thinks he got so many votes in the Presidential Election

Alan Loughnane

Peter Casey

He looks likely to come in second place.

Peter Casey began the his campaign with about 1% support, but according to exit polls, will have received over 20% of the public vote.

Michael D Higgins will return as President of Ireland, there’s no doubt about that, but few would have predicted that Casey would receive such a large percentage of the vote.

Speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland on Saturday morning, Peter Casey dismissed the idea that he received a large vote on the back of his comments regarding the travelling community.

 

“No, absolutely not,” Casey said. “The biggest comment by far is the fact that I pointed out that middle Ireland, the people that get up every morning and go to work are feeling tired.

“They’re feeling tired. They’re feeling that nobody is listening to him. They can see there’s no way to get on the housing ladder, they’re frustrated and it’s getting worse.

“They said, ‘here’s someone that said we definltely need to tackle this problem.’ They’re the ones that are paying all of the bills. We absolutely need social welfare programmes to help the people that need help

“Ireland is not a nation of people who want a hand out, they’re people who want a hand up. And that was the message, it’s nothing to do with the travelling community at all.”

When questioned if he would stand for public office again, Casey did not rule it out.

“We’re going to take a long time to think about it, and probably around 1pm today I’ll let you know,” Casey said.

Peter Casey said he wants free third level education but students should have to remain in the country for five years after graduation: “I don’t want to pay for somebody’s education only to see them move away”.

The interviewer then pointed out that he’s lived most of his life outside of Ireland.