Disability, housing and animal welfare were among the issues raised with Mary Lou McDonald while on a canvass in a Dublin shopping centre on Sunday.
The Sinn Fein leader appealed to voters to lend their support to the main opposition party and told them that the only way to improve various services was to change the government.
A 25-year-old teacher from Dublin told the Sinn Fein leader that she “can’t afford to do anything” and “felt guilty” going shopping when she cannot afford to buy a house.
Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald speaks to members of the public as she canvasses in the Swords Pavilions Shopping Centre, Co Dublin (Grainne Ni Aodha/PA)
“You can’t sustain a life that you want in this country the way it is at the moment. You just can’t, we’re being pushed out the way it is, everything is too expensive whether it’s groceries, shopping.”
Ms McDonald said: “I want you to know at the heart of our efforts is housing, it’s young people in particular, and its not just the young people we want to come out to vote for your future, we want your parents, your grandparents.”
Ms McDonald spoke to two mothers about access to services for children with additional needs.
She said it was important to keep speech and language therapist graduates in the country and attract young people who had emigrated back.
“If we have five more years of Fianna Fail and Fine Gael back in government together, it is not going to get better. We’re asking for a chance and we’re very, very acutely conscious of families like yours,” she told one mother.
Another mother became visibly upset when speaking about her four-year-old son and how she had to stop working.
Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald speaks to members of the public as she canvasses in the Swords Pavilions Shopping Centre, Co Dublin (Grainne Ni Aodha/PA)
“We have a real real problem with timely assessment of needs and then access to the therapies and the supports that children need,” Ms McDonald told her.
“The truth is all of this needs to change and the government needs to change to drive it forward.”
Several people raised with her why enough candidates were not put forward by the party in the 2020 general election.
One man raised an issue with Sinn Fein’s housing plan, claiming it still involved vulture funds, to which Ms McDonald said “you need to get the mix right”.
“I don’t see that we do need that mix,” he said, to which Ms McDonald said “well, then we disagree” before shaking his hand.
One woman, Sonya Barrett O’Connor, raised animal welfare issues and funding for the greyhound racing industry with Ms McDonald, who told the woman she has a rescue dog.
Ms McDonald said: “We are asking for a chance and then you will adjudicate and judge how we deliver, but we have to be given the chance to demonstrate what we can do.”
Earlier on Sunday, Ms McDonald and the Sinn Fein frontbench called on working people “to come out in their droves” next Friday and back the party in enough numbers to become Ireland’s largest party.
Asked if she would be open to a rotating Taoiseach arrangement in the next government, Ms McDonald said it happened so often in the last coalition it “left the population pretty dizzy”.
“For me, personally, I’m acutely conscious of the responsibility and the great honour that it would bring to be Taoiseach and, of course, a lot of hard work. That’s ultimately it.
“When the the excitement subsides, you’re left with with hard work.
“I have, as my colleagues will – I’m sure – confirm, a work ethic second to none. So my biggest feeling around will be the opportunity to get stuck in.”