First meeting for Rabbitte and Kenny on possible ‘rainbow’ coalition

FINE GAEL leader Enda Kenny and Labour leader Pat Rabbitte will this week hold their first formal meeting to sketch out the shape of their proposed ‘rainbow’ coalition.

Both leaders will be accompanied by advisers for the meeting which is provisionally scheduled for mid-week. The meeting will constitute the first substantive discussions on the matter since Mr Rabbitte’s plan for a pre-election pact was announced at the Labour Party annual conference in April.

Mr Rabbitte told RTÉ’s The Week in Politics last night that the meeting would be designed to build on the progress that has been made by the two opposition parties over the past few months. He pointed to recent opinion polls which showed a FG-Labour coalition three points ahead in popular support over the FF-PD coalition.

“We have to build on that,” he said.

“(The next election) will be about credibility and competence.”

However, he was distinctly guarded as to how detailed the discussions would be.

Mr Rabbitte also refused to be drawn into discussion on whether or not the Labour Party would bring demands for a rotating Taoiseach to the table, as Dick Spring did in 1992.

“I do not want to make any presumptions about being in Government,” he said, adding that it was too early to start working out the sharing of responsibility or departments.

A senior Fine Gael source said last night that the meeting would be substantial but very much preliminary.