The Rural Independent group has said it is not interested in going into a government that contains the Green Party.

Speaking to the Irish Farmers Journal on Wednesday, Mattie McGrath, one of the six members of the group, said the Green Party has no mandate from rural Ireland, and that its policies would undermine farming.

“They didn’t get a seat in rural Ireland,” he said. “They don’t understand rural Ireland or its people. In the run-up to the election, they were raving about wolves and 10 cars to a village.”

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“Farming led the recovery 12 years ago, and it can again, if it’s let. But bigger carbon taxes would be unworkable in a buoyant economy, and in the post-lockdown economy, we certainly can’t afford it. We need more detail – the last programme for government was almost 350 pages long, this is more like a recipe,” he concluded.

They don’t understand rural Ireland or its people. In the run-up to the election, they were raving about wolves and 10 cars to a village

The six-strong Rural Independents met Fine Gael’s Paschal Donohoe and Fianna Fàil’s Dara Calleary on Tuesday evening, as the two traditional parties of government look for coalition partners.

The Regional Independents also met Fianna Fàil and Fine Gael, even as Taoiseach Leo Varadkar warned that “government was not for the faint-hearted”.

Denis Naughten said that the group of eight TDs would only enter government programme talks “as equal partners, not a last minute addition”. He called for a deadline on government formation

Fine Gael has clearly stated that it wants a third party in government, preferring either the Green Party, Social Democrats, or Labour.

The Greens are preparing a response to the framework document, which many believe to have been an overture to them joining a coalition. A two-thirds majority of party members would be required to endorse its entry into a coalition government.