Leo puts Ross in his place over gaffe on Olympic bid

BIDDING for the Olympics isn’t a realistic proposition for Dublin, Leo Varadkar has said in an apparent slap down of Sports Minister Shane Ross.

On Tuesday, the Independent Alliance leader raised eyebrows when he suggested that if Ireland’s bid to host the 2023 Rugby World Cup is successful, the country could look at bidding for the Olympics.

‘If we win this bid, I think the sky’s the limit,’ Mr Ross had said.

But yesterday, the Taoiseach said that he couldn’t see Ireland bidding for the Olympics due to the enormous number of policing manpower that would be required in order to keep both the fans and the athletes safe.

‘Olympics don’t come to countries, they come to cities, so if we were to make a bid it would be a Dublin bid rather than an Ireland bid,’ said the Taoiseach, who was speaking in Galway.

‘And I am not sure that we would be able to provide the level of policing, for example, and the security forces that would be required for an Olympics,’ he added.

Fine Gael politician Gay Mitchell was previously ridiculed when he had suggested during his stint as Dublin’s Lord Mayor in 1992, that the city should bid for the Olympics.

The Taoiseach said he believes all of the focus now must be put into Ireland’s Rugby World Cup bid.

Ireland formally launched its bid in June with only France and South Africa standing in their way now ahead of next November’s decision on the matter.

‘An Olympics would be a great thing to do but my priority now is not a Dublin bid for the Olympics, it’s an all-island and all-Ireland bid for the Rugby World Cup,’ added Mr Varadkar.

‘There is a reasonably good chance, and I am cautiously optimistic that we can actually secure that.

‘If we do secure that we will have that announcement later this year and it will happen in 2023. It is going to be something really fabulous.

‘It’s probably the biggest thing we can do as a country in terms of sport and it wouldn’t just be in Dublin,’ the Taoiseach said.

‘It would be the whole country – Northern Ireland as well as the Republic of Ireland,’ he added.

‘My priority is not a bid for the Olympics’