Cowen’s position was ‘untenable’ - Taoiseach tells Dáil

Taoiseach Micheál Martin told the Dáil this evening that Barry Cowen’s position as Minister for Agriculture was “untenable”.

The Taoiseach (pictured above) informed the Dáil that the President, on his advice, had terminated the appointment of Deputy Barry Cowen as a member of the Government.

In his statement the Taoiseach said he accepted Mr Cowen's remorse and apology over the drink-driving ban from 2016.

"He has been completely clear and unambiguous regarding his drink driving offence, he gave a personal statement to this House on July the 7th in which he talked about the stupidity of his actions,” the Taoiseach said to the Dáil.

"He accepted what he did was absolutely wrong and he apologised to all members. I accepted that his remorse was genuine and I accepted his apology.

"When he was first confronted with the allegations, Minister Cowen was immediately clear and emphatic about his drink-driving offence and understood the need to acknowledge this.

"However, he was equally clear and emphatic that one detail of the allegation he was being presented with was completely untrue, namely that he sought to evade gardaí at the time,” the Taoiseach continued.

Mr Martin stated he believed that after seeing the garda report himself this morning, additional issues were raised which required "further explanation and clarification".

The Taoiseach said that Mr Cowen indicated that he would not make a further statement on the matter in the Dáíl.

Mr Martin said: "This decision has created a situation where legitimate doubts and additional questions are being raised, and Government colleagues are expected to address these.”

"This is simply untenable," added Mr Martin, who said he believed that Mr Cowen had an obligation to come before the Dáil, and that the issue was damaging to the ongoing work of Government.