Farewell to FG’s posh poster boy who failed on housing
AFTER an ignominious year on the backbenches, perhaps the writing was on the wall for the man seen as Fine Gael’s posh poster boy, and whose name became synonymous with homelessness and an ever-worsening housing crisis.
Demoted from Cabinet over a year ago, he perhaps took the wise choice to slip away quietly.
From the very start of his Dáil career the ambitious, handsome TD, who turned 39 last week, made waves becoming involved in the so-called five-a-side group.
Many dismissed ‘Murph’ as a sorority style ‘student prince’ who was the gilded creature of a gilded lifestyle.
The ‘posh boy’ from Dublin would, they said, never be able to deal with the rough Enda Kenny-style Country and Western wing of the party.
Eoghan, in contrast to them, came from solidly south Dublin stock of lawyers and artists.
His younger brother Cillian (or Killian Scott) played Tommy Daly in the RTE drama Love/Hate and also appeared in Calvary, Call The Midwife and the Northern Ireland film ‘71. Cillian changed his name to Killian Scott so that he wouldn’t be confused with actor Cillian Murphy.
Eoghan’s older brother Colin, is a playwright. His play Haughey/ Gregory about the relationship between former Taoiseach Charlie Haughey and independent socialist TD, Tony Gregory was first performed at the Peacock Theatre in 2018. Inside the GPO was written and performed as part of the 1916 centenary of the Easter Rising.
In all, there were five boys and one girl in the family.
Their father, Henry, was a barrister and Eoghan told Hot Press in 2016 that the family enjoyed privileges but were not millionaires.
The millionaire comment is questionable – Henry was a Mahon Tribunal barrister, for which he was paid €2.3million.
Henry is also a published author of stories about the legal profession.
His first book, An Eye on the Whiplash and Other Stories, came out in 1998, followed by Brief Cases and A Night in the Inns.
He dedicated the last book to his six children, Colin (the playwright), Jenny (a barrister), Stephen (works in publishing in the UK), Declan, Eoghan (the TD) and Cillian (actor). Until Eoghan, the most famous person in the family was his grandfather, the accountant, Russell Murphy.
Russell was known for his sharp suits, fast race cars and mixing with celebrities, who became his clients. But he was hiding a dark secret – he was stealing their money because he couldn’t change his lifestyle in tough times. After his death in 1984, when Eoghan was one year old, gardaí were called. Murphy had embezzled £2million from his clients, including Gay Byrne.
Eoghan made his way through the Fine Gael ranks by first becoming a party ‘area representative’, which is used to test out potential candidates. He recalls wearing jeans and a casual shirt and being mildly admonished by former Taoiseach, Garrett FitzGerald, who told him he wouldn’t get elected looking like that.
He learned his lesson and returned the next day in a neat suit and polished shoes.
He was elected a councillor in 2009 and a TD in 2011. He had a strong entry into the Dáil and was a leading contributor during committee meetings into the banking collapse.
The redistricting of his constituency, Dublin South East, didn’t go his way in 2015. It created the new Dublin Bay South and cut him from a large well of south Dublin, middle class, FG voters.
He was returned to the Dail in 2016, though, and was appointed a junior minister at the Department of Finance under Enda Kenny’s government.
It was a role in which he was largely comfortable and his committee meetings on banking helped ease him into the job.
That led a year later to his appointment as Housing Minister, under Leo Varadkar. From the beginning, it was a very difficult role. Dublin was hit with a massive housing shortage and Murphy was identified as being part of Leo Varadkar’s ‘posh boys’ network of Dublin Fine Gaelers.
That led to intense criticism of him in public and he was a major
target of online hate during the 2020 general election campaign. One of his worst moments came in the later part of the campaign, when a homeless man was badly injured as council workers were removing homeless tents along the Grand Canal. A caller to Joe Duffy mentioned that the tragic accident happened right under Eoghan Murphy’s election posters. Within minutes, a Murphy campaign worker pulled up in a car to remove the posters, while an Irish Daily Mail reporter took photos. When asked why the posters were being removed, the campaign worker said: ‘It’s a mark of respect.’ Murphy was returned to the Dáil, but, as political commentators predicted, he lost his Housing portfolio.