The question of whether there should be a ban on protests outside politicians’ homes is a “conversation we have to have”, Stephen Donnelly has said. 

TDs from across the political spectrum in recent months have looked out the window of their home to see angry protestors standing outside.

People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy described it as “upsetting” and a “little bit scary” to experience.

Speaking on The Hard Shoulder, Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said he did not know if there is the political appetite for a change in the law but said it is worth considering.

“I’m someone who has had multiple protestors outside my house - not all of them particularly pleasant,” he said.

“If you’d asked me this question even six months ago, I would have given you the answer that I’d previously given - which is no, we shouldn’t legislate for this.

“I have to say, I found young men turning up in balaclavas outside Roderic’s family home - and remember we’ve had a bomb scare at Helen McEntee’s home - [unsettling].

“This is moving into a different place now; we now have well-organised extremists, the far-right, we've seen the violence close to my own home in Newtownmountkennedy - not organised or orchestrated by people in Newtownmountkennedy.”

2KCBXR3 Stephen Donnelly, Minister for Health, arriving at Government Buildings in Dublin before the Cabinet meeting. On Tuesday, 30 March, 2021, in Dublin, Ireland. (Photo by Artur Widak/NurPhoto)

Minister Donnelly said people have a “very clear understanding” of why someone would wear a balaclava and its historical associations.

“It is a direct threat to somebody’s safety and it has connotations of a threat to somebody’s life for the reasons we understand from the Troubles,” he said.

“I think it’s a conversation we have to have if we have got to a point where we now have politicians who are receiving bomb threats and gangs turning up in balaclavas outside their home in the middle of the day.”

In 2016, British MP Jo Cox was murdered by a far-right extremist and in 2021 David Amess was killed by a man who had been radicalised by Islamic State propaganda.

No Irish TD has been murdered since the 1920s and Minister Donnelly says he “really hopes” no one will be.

“But I can certainly tell you, I’ve been in politics for 13 years, it has changed and it’s accelerated in the last year or two,” he said.

Main image: Stephen Donnelly.