Ahern sees viable coalition between Fianna Fáil and Labour

FOREIGN Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern believes Fianna Fáil and Labour could make a good government.

Someone clearly has to let him in on the secret that the two parties really don’t like each other much. Nor have they worked well in the past, if an extraordinary exchange in the Dáil this week is anything to go by.

On Wednesday night in Rome Mr Ahern told the Irish Examiner that Fianna Fáil and Labour could team up well.

“I think that Fianna Fáil would have quite a lot of common with the trade union movement,” he said. “If Fianna Fáil were in government with Labour in the future, it would be a good government.”

However, he didn’t envisage it happening, simply because Labour leader Pat Rabbitte had already “excluded that possibility.” Evidently, however, someone had neglected to tell Dermot that it was more than just Pat who might have difficulties with the concept.

The same day, Defence Minister Willie O’Dea had got involved in an astonishing - even by Dáil standards - exchange with Labour’s Brendan Howlin.

Willie seems to spend as much time defending Fianna Fáil as the realm. So when Brendan had the temerity to ask the Taoiseach where the Cabinet’s health programme was, Willie jumped straight in, barking: “The deputy did not do a whole pile when he was in charge of the Department of Health (during the Fianna Fáil-Labour coalition government of the early ‘90s).”

Brendan: “The minister was my junior minister. He barely ever turned up. He was too busy knocking on doors in Limerick.”

Willie: “I could not get anything done with the deputy. He blocked everything. He was in the department all the time doing nothing.”

Clearly, Dermot should attempt to persuade Pat Rabbite to reconsider. Fianna Fáil and Labour would be a winning ticket, if only for the fun and games that would undoubtedly ensue.