FF ministers divided over coalition with Labour

FIANNA FÁIL’S election strategies are causing growing tension among senior ministers.

Social Affairs Minister Seamus Brennan, one of the sharpest strategists in the party, has criticised efforts by some ministers to lay the ground for a coalition with Labour next time out.

Mr Brennan, who was twice national director of elections for the party, says that is too defeatist a message to send the electorate. “The Fianna Fáil-PD alliance is there. It has managed the country continually (since 1997), and we should offer it for re-election. And I think we should not get distracted with other combinations, because that’s to give up and assume we can’t get re-elected.”

Yet there are now clear divisions between Fianna Fáil ministers over their coalition preferences. While several say they wish to remain in power with the PDs, others are indicating a preference for Labour. For instance, Foreign Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern supplied an analysis prepared for him, which discussed a Fianna Fáil-Labour coalition, to party strategists. The analysis envisaged an internal heave against Labour leader Pat Rabbitte, who is opposed to entering government with Fianna Fáil, if that option is on the cards after the election, likely to be in mid-2007.

Though Arts Minister John O’Donoghue said he hoped the current government remained intact, he predicted Mr Rabbitte’s demise should Fianna Fáil and Labour begin talking.

“Judging from his previous comments - and I don’t mean this in any derogatory way - we will then be experiencing Pat Rabbitte’s political wake and there will be a not inconsiderable number of (Labour’s) parliamentary party who will be passing around the snuff and the whiskey,” he said.

Enterprise Minister Micheál Martin also said the present government worked well but indicated his leanings were centre-left. “I have no major ideological problem with going into government with the Labour Party.” But he stressed “it would be subject to their policy platform”.

Government chief whip Tom Kitt, openly identifying his leanings as centre-left, implied he would prefer a coalition with Labour if the conditions were right. But Mr Rabbitte’s refusal to countenance such an option seemed to preclude that possibility. “Having had the experience in Cabinet of working on a daily basis with our PD colleagues and in light of Pat Rabbitte having ruled out a coalition with us ... I feel we should stay with the PDs.”

Other ministers were more emphatic about their desire to maintain the status quo, including Education Minister Mary Hanafin, Defence Minister Willie O’Dea and Environment Minister Dick Roche.

A spokesman for the latter said: “Dick Roche is of the opinion that this is the most successful government in the history of the State and if people had any sense, they would vote to re-elect it.”