Justice Minister Helen McEntee has not ruled herself out of becoming the next leader of Fine Gael.
Ms McEntee, who has recently returned from maternity leave, said Tanáiste Leo Varadkar has her full support.
But she said she is ambitious in her job and when asked if she has aspirations to become leader of her party one day, she said she couldn’t answer that right now.
She said: “Leo has my full support.
“The Tanáiste has my full support in his role as the leader of Fine Gael and I look forward to working with him and for him leading Fine Gael into the next General Election.
“I think I’ve always said that I have ambition in the work that I do.
“My focus at the moment is Minister for Justice.
“Anything beyond that is speculation and not something I can answer at this point but he [Leo Varadkar] has my full support, just to stress that.”
Ms McEntee also said she is open to looking at measures which may stop people from protesting outside of politician's and public representatives' homes.
Speaking to RTÉ’s Claire Byrne show, she said: “Personally I believe there are a lot of spaces where people can protest.
“I’m never against the idea of people protesting, it is all of our rights to do so but if you are a public representative, you have constituency offices, departments, Leinster House, you’ve all of these places that people can protest.
“And I personally feel when you take it to somebody’s home, their family, potentially their children, their neighbours in a built up environment and I think there are enough spaces for people to protest without people taking it there.”
