Mol an óige: Paul Lawless TD
Knock native Paul Lawless made Aontú history at the 2024 general election when he became the party’s second ever Dáil representative. The 33-year-old talks to Ciaran Brennan about his political origins, his priorities for Mayo, and Aontú’s “common sense” politics.
Prior to Lawless’ entry to politics, he was a promising footballer who had represented the Republic of Ireland in soccer at underage level. He earned a spot in the Derby County Football Club’s youth academy, but eventually returned to Ireland to study at University College Cork. Lawless then earned a soccer scholarship which saw him attend Clayton State University in the US state of Georgia.
Upon returning to Mayo following his time in the US, he began training with his local GAA club, Aghamore, where he learned that many of his peers were settling in Dublin. This inspired him to put his name on the ballot paper in the 2019 local elections.
While leafleting, Lawless discovered that many people in Mayo were awaiting cataract surgery. To address this, he organised a bus from Mayo to Belfast for local people to avail of cataract surgery under the HSE’s Cross Border Directive. The scheme enables people to get planned healthcare in another European Union or European Economic Area country.
Although he was unsuccessful in 2019, the campaign and the Cataract Bus initiative enhanced his political profile. Lawless expanded the campaign after the election to provide people with services at Kingsbridge Private Hospital in Belfast and Derry. It enabled patients to bypass waiting lists for hip replacements, carpal tunnel surgery, and more.
Following an unsuccessful campaign in the 2020 general election, Lawless was elected to Mayo County Council in June 2024. He was elected to the Dáil shortly after. It was a surprise victory for the party and Lawless, a former maths and PE teacher at Ballyhaunis Community School.
“What inspired the success? I do not know,” says Lawless. “The bookies did not see it. The media did not see it. I worked hard on delivering for people in the area and I am passionate about Mayo.”
Lawless asserts that he “never ran for self-adulation or anything like that”, adding that “there would have been easier roads to Leinster House”.
Tracing his political origins, Lawless says he “did not come from a party-political household”. He continues: “I would have voted for various different politicians over the years from all parties.”
Tracing his political influences, Lawless says: “My politics is inspired by community. My politics is inspired by obligation.” When asked what drew him to Aontú, he describes the party as one led by “common sense”.
“I think Aontú is a growing party, we are going very well. I think our common sense politics is resonating,” he adds.
Aontú is one of the most vocal parties regarding its support for a united Ireland. Lawless asserts that “the all-Ireland economy” is the greatest opportunity presented by a united Ireland. He says that the greatest challenge is the integration of services.
The Knock native adds: “We are not making sufficient preparation for that, and I think that is a key challenge and the potential for poll to happen prematurely without the necessary preparation.”
Priorities
Outlining his priorities, Lawless states that he wants to put the west of Ireland “on an equal footing”, to the rest of Ireland adding that it “needs targeted investment”. He says he wants to see the west’s infrastructure developed. Welcoming the Western Rail Corridor, he indicates that he wants it to be expanded. Lawless also states that road infrastructure needs to be upgraded and Knock Airport needs to be developed further.
The 33-year-old asserts that “housing delivery is falling behind the rest of the country”. He says only five affordable homes have been delivered in Mayo in recent years. In December 2025, Mayo applied for the development of 35 affordable homes in Castlebar under the Affordable Purchase Scheme.
Lawless states that his issues might have been identified earlier if there were more young politicians. “Every age and type of person has a different instinct or a different perspective and that should be represented,” he says. “I think it is very important to have all types of people in politics including young people.”
Discussing the Government’s new housing plan, Delivering Homes, Building Communities, published in November 2025, Lawless says there are “some positives”.
However, he asserts that it does not address the high costs of building houses. He says there are people who have planning permission approved and mortgages secured that “cannot afford to build their homes” in Mayo.
Lawless states that he wants “to see the protection of farmers”. He outlines one issue he sees facing farmers: “The Common Agricultural Policy [CAP] is set to have a significant reduction of about 20 per cent.
“Any cut to CAP will have significant impact on Ireland in general but particularly in the west where there are smaller farms.”
Lawless also pins crime as one of his priorities. He asserts that “Garda numbers are effectively falling in Mayo”. This has a “knock-on impact” on gardaí and “people’s perception of safety”. He states that people’s perception of safety changed between the local election campaign in 2019, and the general election campaign in 2024.
Immigration
Lawless devotes a significant amount of his attention to immigration. He asserts that Aontú “helped significantly change the course” of the discussion on immigration.
“The previous government was driven by ideology over right and wrong and over what was logical. We were the first party to lead a discussion about how the IPAS [International Protection Accommodation Service] system needed to be a rules-based system,” he says.
The current government has demonstrably shifted closer to the right in its discussion of immigration. Taoiseach Micheál Martin TD recently said “about 80 per cent” of asylum seekers are refused on their first stage of appeal, adding that “what you are looking at here is economic migration, primarily”.
However, government figures show that the average monthly percentage for refusals on final applications from January 2025 to October was 53 per cent. The data does not include details of applicants being refused because they were identified as economic migrants.
Despite this, Lawless stated that “80 per cent of [IPAS] applicants are actually economic migrants”, in a social media video he posted opposing an IPAS centre in Ballyhaunis, Mayo.
Furthermore, in a social media video posted on 2 October 2025, Lawless stated that IPAS incurred costs of €1.5 billion in 2024, citing the report on the Accounts of the Public Services 2024 by the office of the Comptroller and Auditor General.
The report states: “The IPAS incurred expenditure of almost €1.1 billion on the provision of accommodation and related services to IP applicants in 2024.”
When these inaccuracies presented by Lawless are outlined to him, he says: “First of all, the majority of IPAS applicants do fail. That is a fact. That is information that we brought into the public domain. Many do reapply, many are supported by NGOs. Many remain in the system for years and ultimately get leave to remain. That is a fact.
“We will be unapologetic in relation to calling this out and we believe in a rules-based system, we believe that people who genuinely need our help, people who are fleeing war and persecution deserve our help.
“But those who are using our system, and abusing our system should be shown the door and that is only right and proper in a functioning democracy.”
The Economic and Social Research Institute’s (ESRI) January 2026 report, The role of misperceptions in attitudes to immigration, finds that people who hold more inaccurate beliefs are “significantly more likely to feel negatively about immigration and to cite it as a major national issue”.
When this is outlined to Lawless in the context of the inaccuracies he previously presented, he maintains that his broader point stands, saying that “people’s attitudes are changing”. He continues: “People want a compassionate approach but people want to know that the system is not being abused.
“The spend in terms of the IPAS system is phenomenal and the majority of those people, and therefore the majority of the spend, is actually unnecessary because of the system.”
Lawless requested time to research the inaccuracies presented to him by eolas Magazine and respond. No response has been received at the time of writing.
‘Common sense’ politics
When asked what “common sense” policies Aontú would introduce, Lawless points to the referendums on family and care in April 2024 in which Aontú advocated for a no-no vote.
The then-coalition government of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party had advocated for a yes-yes vote along with opposition parties Sinn Féin, the Social Democrats, Labour, and People Before Profit.
Both referendums were defeated, with 67.69 per cent voting ‘no’ in the family referendum which proposed to alter the wording in the constitution to include families which are not based in marriage. The care referendum aimed to change the wording around the role of women in the home was also defeated with 73.93 per cent voting ‘no’.
Pointing to more common sense politics, Lawless outlines how Aontú led the campaign for Maria Steen to get on the ballot paper for the presidential election. Lawless indicates that this decision was taken because there was a “very narrow field of candidates”.
There were three candidates: eventual winner Catherine Connolly, former Fine Gael TD Heather Humphreys, and former Dublin senior football manager Jim Gavin who dropped out but remained on the ballot paper.
Lawless asserts that Connolly and Humphreys “were never going to reflect the myriad of opinions that exist in Ireland”. The Mayo TD says the narrow field meant some topics such as crime and the cost-of-living were not discussed to the extent they should have been.
“That was our primary objective: to ensure there was a rich field where people had an opportunity to vote for someone they felt reflected their views.”
Ambitions
Lawless insists that his ambition for his political career is to deliver for his constituents. Indicating that Aontú can achieve more by working with other parties, Lawless states that the goal for the party is to become “a player in a government and in a coalition”.
“We can achieve so much in opposition, we can push the Government in a particular direction, and I think we have done that quite well for a small party, but ultimately the long-term ambition, I think, is to be in government making decisions that are right for the country,” he says.
Asserting that he is not a politician for “power or any personal gratification”, he says: “The day I feel I cannot deliver for my community is the day I will retire.”
