Rabbitte urges edgy FF voters to vote Labour

LABOUR leader Pat Rabbitte last night urged disillusioned Fianna Fáil voters to switch to their “natural home” in his party as he blasted nine years of failure by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern.

Addressing Labour’s front bench team ahead of today’s annual conference in Dublin, Mr Rabbitte said the Rainbow Alliance with Fine Gael would defy predictions and be able to command a majority at the next election to push through a centre-left agenda.

In a blatant swipe at recent overtures from Mr Ahern that an FF/Labour coalition was the only sustainable pact in the next Dáil, Mr Rabbitte made a direct pitch for Fianna Fáil voters to change sides.

Citing recent opinion polls showing Fianna Fáil losing nearly a quarter of its 2002 backing, the Labour leader insisted the Government was haemorrhaging support.

“Clearly the deserters are not the rich and the powerful. In other European member states, these people would be natural Labour voters. The Labour Party is the natural home for disaffected former Fianna Fáil voters,” he said.

Talking up the conference’s Preparing for Government theme, Mr Rabbitte said the Rainbow Alliance was poised to put a raft of policy alternatives before the electorate.

“A lot of ink has been expended doubting whether Labour and Fine Gael can make up the seats’ deficit.

“I have no doubt that the Labour/Fine Gael alliance will be able to have their candidate for Taoiseach elected in the next Dáil,” he said.

Dismissing the relationship between the PDs and Fianna Fáil as a collapsing coalition, he said both parties were shamelessly looking around for other partners.

“The public have sensed that the Government lost its way. There is no energy, no new ideas, no purpose other than to stay in office,” he said.

Mr Rabbitte also poured scorn on Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney’s admission that there was a national emergency in A&E wards.

“The declaration of a national emergency after nine years is a shocking indictment of three successive ministers,” he added.

Returning to the issue of foreign workers in the Irish economy, which got him into hot water earlier in the year, Mr Rabbitte was more careful with his language and claimed the State had no coherent immigration policy which meant illegal working and exploitative practices were being allowed to continue unmonitored and unpunished.

“Ireland can have no interest in the development of a low-wage economy. The race to the bottom has no winners here,” he said.

Mr Rabbitte, whose keynote address to the conference will be broadcast on RTÉ tonight, also wished Mr Ahern and his British counterpart success as frantic Northern negotiations resume next week.