Year ahead will be a test of leaders’ abilities to reform governance

The single issue wholly within our control, amid much uncertainty, is public sector pay, writes Gerard Howlin

2017 is set to be a test of capacity to change and reform governance, north and south on the island. It is likely to see the beginning, if not completion of major changes, of leadership within Sinn Féin. Unfolding events do not match the scale of opportunity, provided by the depth of crisis, offered to the then newly elected Fine Gael-Labour coalition nearly six years ago, but current events are nonetheless pressing. Something will give.

History teaches, it is usually political momentum in the face of the baulking hulk of institutional stasis. That’s essentially what happened after 2011, when a crisis was largely wasted. Then a determined, but narrowly focused, and institutionally conservative government succeeded in completing the restoration of order to the public finances.

They did so at considerable political cost to themselves. It destroyed the Labour Party. But their martyrology is overdone. They could have chosen a course of sweeping institutional change. If it went pear-shaped electorally, it could hardly have ended worse. Instead, focusing not just on government, but fatally coming to identify politically with its institutions, 2011 – 2016 was a restorationist, not a reforming project.

That was always the default disposition of Fine Gael. It is perhaps a broader church than it is given credit for, in terms of its social attitudes. But it is institutionally conservative. And it fundamentally struggles to adapt to, let alone lead, a freewheeling, autotomised society. Its belief — far more than a political calculation — that the 2016 election, coinciding with the centenary of the Easter Rising, was about continuity, was tested to breaking point.

Last February the long, nearly 90-year hegemony of the two and a half party system, ruptured in 2011, was finally broken. It won’t be put back together again. A small but telling point, is that for the first time Labour is in opposition to, not with, Fine Gael. Fine Gael is in government with no other party, and reliant on Fianna Fáil to deliver its programme. Fianna Fáil redux is waiting and watching. It is almost certainly committed, circumstances permitting, to waiting for some time yet.

But what it is not yet, is decided. Indeed as its attitude on water charges to name one issue, and in seeking before Christmas to extend haphazardly areas designated like Dublin and Cork, under the Government’s rent control plan, it is in crucial respects a party fundamentally undecided about what it stands for. Its recent initiatives, are not aligned with its values.

Fianna Fáil was richly gifted by Fine Gael ineptness in the local elections of 2014 and the general election of 2016. It may be lucky again, but it may not. The party capitalised on its opportunity last February with a strong performance from Micheál Martin. Part of that performance was a skewering of Fine Gael over its plans to abolish USC. Electorally Michael Noonan made two fundamental economic calls in his political career.

On was to propose compensating taxi drivers after the industry deregulated in 2002. Another was the promise to abolish USC in 2016. Both were enormous mistakes. The relative juxtaposition of Fianna Fáil preaching restraint and probity, so soon after the events of the economic crash, caught Fine Gael off guard. But that was then. There are worryingly recurring instances of Fianna Fáil treating its new values now like old clothes. Water is one issue, rent controls is another and the happenstance of how it arrived with an offer of a €5 social welfare increase across the board, beggars belief. Micheál Martin provided strong leadership on camera during the last election.

It is less clear whether the same rigour is applied within an enlarged parliamentary party. The attitude of its four parliamentary representatives on the Joint Committee on the Future Funding of Domestic Water Services, will be watched closely now. However, Fianna Fáil slid into the quagmire of opposing water charges, it must find a way out, to be a credible party of government.

Events in Northern Ireland since Monday are leading the news. Regardless of whether he is a candidate for the new Assembly, the departure of Martin McGuiness from the main political stage is in train. The next question is how this impacts on Gerry Adams’s own plans. Assuming an election in the Republic is a distinct possibility, though not a certainty in 2018, he has until the summer, or autumn at the latest, to decide whether to lead on, or step aside. I have always believed the ultimate challenge for Sinn Féin was never Gerry Adams’s leadership, but its end. The most fundamental judgements are at stake for Sinn Féin. 2017 is certain to be a time of transition, and perhaps complete change.

That change coincides with deep divide in Northern Ireland. Arlene Foster arrived with great élan. Whether as a former official unionist member, or coming from a Church of Ireland background, she felt she needed to practice her no-surrender credentials I do not know. What is certain now, is that the parties themselves, will not of their own violation, put a power-sharing administration back together again. Another Hillsborough or St Andrews process will be required, which in turn presupposes the intensive engagement of the two governments.

Things have fundamentally moved on in London, and I do not see that engagement forthcoming at the highest levels. It’s an odd thing, but over the last 12 months, government has become less appetising for political parties, north and south. Perhaps premium payments should be considered?

It’s payment of course that keeps the public service here oiled. The single issue, wholly within our control amidst much uncertainty, is public sector pay. Containing demands for more pay, while investing in services via more personnel and equipment is the core conundrum. We pay more for health than many others with better services, in Ireland. Critical pinch points notwithstanding, money is not the single issue. We are simply paying over the odds for substandard outcomes, in a bizarrely organised system, which feather beds providers at the expense of patients who can’t get a bed themselves.

There was a bizarre coincidence at Christmas. Home Sweet Home, led by people mainly famous for campaigning against water charges, demanded investment in housing, which must come from the same scarce resources. Our hospital system is creaking for want of investment in bed capacity, and better primary care. But ironically, the necessary resources are demanded to further increase the premium packages including pension, generally but not always enjoyed, by those delivering within our system. Managers are scapegoated, fairly to a degree.

But underlying management the key capacity is not just more beds, or better primary care, it is better flexibility. That flexibility is utterly, cynically hogtied in a system in which vested interest, is the controlling effective interest. This is the baulking hulk of institutional stasis against which political momentum usually flags. But curiously if it is named for what it is, it is much less intimidating.