Defiant Joan Burton says Labour's main general election battle is with Fine Gael

Tánaiste Joan Burton will claim today that the Labour Party’s main battle come the general election will be with Coalition partners Fine Gael, not the opposition.

Ms Burton will hold a symposium on James Connolly as part of Labour’s 1916 commemoration programme, during which she is expected to make her remarks, which are likely to anger many in Fine Gael.

“The battle of ideas these past five years has, in my view, been entirely between the Government parties,” she will say. “So in the forthcoming election, based on all the evidence to date, I expect the pattern to repeat itself. The battle of ideas will continue to be between ourselves and Fine Gael — on economic issues and on social issues.

“I don’t mean that... we will suddenly begin tearing shreds off each other.

“But we have different ideas about how to achieve that vision. So each party fights its corner. We have a battle of ideas. We negotiate. We compromise. The centre-left and the centre-right find centre ground.

“The opposition have offered little in the way of substantive ideas. Having led us into crisis in the first place, Fianna Fáil offered no way out. Sinn Féin, having supported the ruinous bank guarantee, then advocated default, later advocated a Greek-style approach, and in every instance, got it spectacularly wrong.”

In an interview with the Irish Examiner yesterday, Ms Burton said she believes there is a “high probability” her party will be returned to government at the next general election despite poor performances in recent polls.

Ms Burton conceded the election is going to be “very, very challenging”, not just for her party “but for every party”, in the wake of a two-point bounce for the Labour Party in the latest Red C poll.

Defending her party’s failure to resist cuts they vowed to stave off at the last election, Ms Burton said the promises, which included resisting water charges, were made on the assumption that they would be the main government party in 2011, which had not come to pass.

She defended Alan Kelly, the minister with responsibility for housing, who has been the subject of negative press due to claims he leaked damaging poll data, which he has denied.

Alan Kelly

Asked if Mr Kelly was an asset or liability, she said: “Absolutely an asset. He’s presiding over very challenging issues, Irish Water, and to kickstart and get life into a housing industry that had died, and he’s got the funds now and it’s the largest allocation of funds in the history of the State.”