Independents 4 Change
Which party was Clare Daly a member of in Apr 2016?
Clare Daly Clare Daly ( born 16 April 1968 ) is an Irish politician who has been a Member of the European Parliament ( MEP ) from Ireland for the Dublin constituency since July 2019 . She is a member of Independents 4 Change , part of the The Left in the European Parliament – GUE/NGL . She served as a Teachta Dála ( TD ) from 2011 to 2019 . Daly was elected as a Socialist Party TD for the Dublin North constituency at the 2011 general election . Previously a Socialist Party Councillor for the Swords electoral area on Fingal County Council , she resigned from the Socialist Party on 31 August 2012 , redesignating herself as a United Left Alliance TD . Early life . Daly is from Newbridge , County Kildare . Her father , Kevin Daly , was a Colonel in the Irish Army and Director of Signals . She is a long-standing atheist , though her brother and an uncle are in the Catholic priesthood . Daly studied accountancy at Dublin City University . She was twice elected president of the Students Union and was active in the students movement as a campaigner for abortion rights and information . On leaving college she took a job in the catering section of Aer Lingus on a low wage , and became SIPTUs shop steward at Dublin Airport when the airline was engaged in extensive cost-cutting and outsourcing . Daly was elected to the Labour Partys Administrative Committee as a youth representative . She was expelled from the Labour Party in 1989 alongside Joe Higgins and other supporters of the Militant tendency . Career . Local politics . On 19 September 2003 , Daly was jailed for a month , alongside 21 others from the Anti-Bin Tax Campaign for breaching a High Court order preventing protests leading to obstruction of the councils non-collection policy for those not paying bin charges . She was also an organiser of the Anti-Water charges campaign in Swords in the late-1990s . Daly was elected as a Fingal County Councillor for the Swords area in the 1999 local elections . She was re-elected at the 2004 local elections and the 2009 local elections , topping the poll on each occasion . Dáil Éireann . She first ran for a seat in Dáil Éireann at the 1997 general election , receiving 7.2% on that occasion and 8.2% at the by-election later in the year . At the 2002 general election she received 5,501 votes ( 12.5% ) , narrowly missing a seat . At the 2007 general election she received 9% of the vote . Daly was eventually elected to Dáil Éireann at the 2011 general election , taking 15.2% of the first preference vote . She committed to facilitating the nomination of Senator David Norris for a place on the ballot paper ahead of the 2011 presidential election . She announced that she would not register to pay a new household charge brought in as part of the latest austerity budget , calling it reprehensible , and telling Phil Hogan , the minister responsible , in the Dáil : You cant bring everyone to court . In February 2012 , it was reported that she would introduce a bill to provide for limited access to abortion where there is “real and substantial risk to the life” of the pregnant woman , in line with the X Case . The bill was defeated before its second reading on 19 April 2012 . In June 2012 , Daly refused to call for the resignation of her friend and political ally , Mick Wallace in the wake of his VAT controversy . It was reported that the ULA were to confront her over this stance . Daly resigned from the Socialist Party on 31 August 2012 . In a statement , the Socialist Party said it believed Ms Daly had resigned because she placed more value on her political connection with Independent TD Mick Wallace than on the political positions and work of the Socialist Party . Daly described the claim as absolute nonsense and stated that she had not called for Wallaces resignation because the Socialist Party had not called for his resignation . She requested a share of the €120,000 Socialist Partys Leaders Allowance to allow her to continue to fund her activities as an Independent TD . In 2012 , Daly used travel expenses to cover expenses related to her attendance at anti-household charge meetings around the country . Daly said that legal advice was being sought as there was a lack of clarity around the issue and that she would refund any money that was used inappropriately . In April 2013 , along with another TD , Joan Collins , she founded a new political party called United Left . Following the 39th G8 summit , Daly accused the Fine Gael-Labour government of “prostituting” the country to US President Barack Obama and criticised what she described as media and political slobbering over his wife Michelle and their children during their stay in Ireland . She also called Obama a hypocrite and a war criminal for speaking about peace whilst using drones to bomb foreign civilians and wanting to supply weapons to Syrian rebels . Taoiseach Enda Kenny responded to her comments , saying they were disgraceful and beneath you and invoked the diaspora and to the victims of The Troubles since President Obama has supported peace in Northern Ireland . In May 2015 , Dalys passion compared to that of others such as Micheál Martin and Gerry Adams during her questioning of Taoiseach Enda Kenny over the sale of Aer Lingus was remarked upon by media . In December 2015 , Daly along with independent TDs Mick Wallace and Maureen OSullivan each put forward offers of a €5,000 surety for a 23-year-old man being prosecuted under terrorism legislation in the Special Criminal Court in Dublin charged with membership of an illegal dissident republican terrorist organisation . At the 2016 general election , she stood as an Independents 4 Change candidate in the Dublin Fingal constituency , and was elected . European Parliament . At the 2019 European Parliament elections , she was elected for the Dublin constituency . She received a final total of 87,770 votes , or 11.6% , and took the third seat . In December 2019 , the London Times reported Daly had appointed her former husband , Michael Murphy , as a European Parliamentary Assistant . The rules in the European Parliament prohibit the employment of spouses or stable non-marital partners . Daly previously employed the son of fellow Independents4Change MEP Mick Wallace . The Times described Daly as one of the busiest Irish members in the European parliament this term .