Fianna Fáil the largest Opposition party in both houses (Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann) of the Oireachtas, with party leader Micheál Martin entering into a confidence and supply arrangement with a Fine Gael-led minority government at the beginning of the 32nd Dáil. Fianna Fáil is a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe and of Liberal International. The party is also organised in Northern Ireland and intends to run in local government elections there for the first time in 2019. Fianna Fáil was founded by Éamon de Valera, a former leader of Sinn Féin. He and a number of
Political funding in Ireland Political funding in Ireland Political funding in Ireland has re-emerged as an issue of public policy quite recently when in 2012 the Electoral Act of 1997 was amended to cover basic needs of transparency and control. Details about the sources of political funds are rather scarce. Based on the information published for 1998 Murphy and Farrell contend that Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin were the parties which received the highest amounts of private funding. Fianna Fáil reported £432,501 and Sinn Féin total donations of £230,000. Whereas the bulk of the former funds were contributed by the business sector (e.g. hoteliers,