Recession plan - Failure to act shows lack of leadership

The call by Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny for a suspension of the national pay deal for 12 months was in terms of Social Partnership, which proved particularly useful over the years in providing industrial peace.

Social Partnership was designed to deal with the economic crisis of the 1980s, and it played a fundamental part in tackling those economic difficulties. With the backing of Fine Gael, the Fianna Fáil government made unpalatable choices in the late 1980s, and the public responded to that leadership in a positive way.

Finance Minister Brian Lenihan emphasised in a radio interview yesterday that the country is currently living beyond its means.

“We cannot continue to borrow for day-to-day purposes,” he warned. “We have to adjust our public expenditure to ensure that it corresponds to what we can afford. We don’t have any option on this.”

Within a month of his election as taoiseach, Charles Haughey delivered a similar warning to the country, but then proceeded to do essentially nothing about the problem for the remainder of his term.

Brian Cowen has assumed office after a period of relatively similar fiscal extravagance by the State, but he has been largely invisible when it comes to reassuring the public. He has not been articulating any coherent or cohesive government plan, with the result that there is a distinct public perception of a lack of proper leadership.

There has been waste and extravagant expenditure on the part of the public sector that screams out for reform. It has been patently obvious for years. It has been like the elephant in the room that successive governments have been ignoring.

This has little to do with any real service being provided for the public. It is about the abuse of services being provided for civil servants alone.

Benchmarking was introduced to ensure that the public sector was brought up to the pay levels enjoyed in the private sector, but it has far outstretched them. Issues like travelling expenses and sick leave have been grossly abused.

Teachers have been railing over the steps in relation to substitute teachers, but they are conveniently ignoring the flagrant abuse among their own colleagues in the whole area of sick leave. As in other areas of the public sector, sick leave has been abused as a kind paid holiday entitlement.

There have been instances of public servants claiming expenses for travelling to unnecessary meetings, and even claiming for separate expenses when several travelled in the same car. There is also the wanton extravagant waste of throwing good money after bad in paying for the storage of the useless voting machines.

By its failure to act on such matters, the Government has not only failed miserably to provide the leadership that people have been paying for and expect, but it is also demonstrating that it is grossly out of touch with the electorate.

The disillusionment is apparent in the performance of Fianna Fáil in recent public opinion polls.