Bertigate leaves FF going full speed in the wrong direction

ON each day of an election campaign, political parties find themselves in one of three positions.

The first finds them controlling the news agenda by putting across the strongest message of the day.

The second finds them also controlling the news agenda by punching holes in an opponent’s message.

The third finds them in a spot of bother which has “trouble” written all over it.

Five years ago, Fianna Fáil didn’t have as much as a breeze at their backs. They had a Force 12 hurricane.

By day three of the 2002 campaign, FF had got into a comfortable groove they stayed in for the remainder of the campaign.

The sequence went like this. Bertie Ahern went into the Dáil late at night and announced the election. By the following morning, he had launched the Fianna Fáil manifesto with great razzmatazz and had begun his whistlestop sprint around the country.

Every morning Fianna Fáil controlled the news agenda by pushing out a bright new message. And every day its very assertive rebuttal unit was able to dismiss the messages of a very divided and fragmented opposition. By day three of the campaign, most newspaper commentators were predicting the race had already been lost by Fine Gael and Labour.

Not this time. Though the Fianna Fáil campaign follows the form and no expenses spared pattern (including a huge staff, most of them political advisors who have resigned their government positions), this time it’s different.

It’s not that the campaign hasn’t really taken off. It’s that it seems to have belly-flopped in its early days.

On day three, FF unveiled a ‘new’ pensions policy which included only one new item — an SSIA-type savings scheme to replace current PRSA pension scheme.

Like much of the FF campaign (the election announcement, the hastily arranged press conference on Sunday afternoon), it had a hurried and cobbled-together look to it. Seamus Brennan said it had been in gestation for over two years. Could have fooled me. No costings. No real indications of the percentage the State will pay. No idea as to the upper limits.

It was FF’s own fault pensions bombed as an attention-grabber. For in the first three days of the campaign, there has only been one story, all pointing back to Bertiegate.

The revelations in the Irish Mail on Sunday’s about his former partner Celia Larkin receiving £30,000 from Manchester businessman Michael Wall have dragged on into the middle of the week with no sign of abating.

The Taoiseach compounded his difficulties on Monday when his ‘explanation’ for the transaction — “it was a stamp duty issue” — led to more confusion.

Yesterday, the FF strategy was to stop digging. Junior minister Brian Lenihan tersely said it was a matter for the Mahon Tribunal at the FF briefing yesterday. Extraordinarily the Taoiseach buttoned his lip when questioned by reporters.

Asked why he wouldn’t answer the question, he said if he gave an answer today, the press would just ask another question tomorrow.

That was an amazing non-answer. But clamming up isn’t going to abate the feeding frenzy. Like the 2002 campaign, the Fianna Fáil campaign is at full speed — only backwards.