Macroom native plays key role in UK Labour Party’s election success

AS the Labour Party swept to victory in last week’s UK general election, a Macroom man played a major role in the party’s success.

Morgan McSweeney from Macroom, whose family roots are in Fine Gael, was Labour’s much-feted director of campaigns.

The son of Tim and Carmel McSweeney, the 46-year-old, who studied politics at Middlesex University, only took up his post in March and is now a key figure within the Labour Party.

Speaking on radio, his dad Tim said he had stayed up all night watching the results as his daughter-in-law, Morgan’s wife Imogen Walker, was also a candidate and got elected in the Hamilton & Clyde Valley constituency in Scotland.

‘We were always involved in Fine Gael here in Macroom and he got involved in politics in his teens. He went to college over there and got more interested in politics and saw that Labour had a better understanding of the Ireland situation,’ said Tim, who said they are all very proud of what he has achieved.

Morgan was back in Macroom last weekend to collect his son who was staying with Tim and Carmel, while Scottish newspapers have described Morgan and Imogen as a ‘Labour power couple.’

Meanwhile, another Corkman – Damien Egan – was making headlines after he successfully retained his seat, having won a seat initially from the Conservatives on February 15th in the Kingswood by-election.

He was born in Cork but moved to the UK with his family at a young age, first to London and then to Bristol. He and his family experienced homelessness for a period and lived in temporary accommodation, which he said shaped his opinions. He received a whopping 19,004 votes in the newly-created Bristol North East Constituency, with 45.3% of the vote.