No-one will win if the Government loosens the budget purse strings

Beneath the palaver about budgetary arithmetic and you find a shark-like instinct for political survival. Deadlines famously focus the mind, and there is no deadline is like a looming election.

No election is imminent of course. But the general election campaign has effectively begun. Once local and European elections are over, the psychological step-change kicks in. Mid-term elections are like burying a parent. You know you have moved into the waiting room of the funeral parlour. It may be a while, but it’s now inevitable. You have a sense of your own mortality; it’s do or die.

This government is haunted by the loss of office in 1997. Its four key members were ministers then. Joan Burton was a junior minister who lost her seat. Enda Kenny, Michael Noonan and Brendan Howlin were in cabinet. It was a reasonably competent government whose policies were largely prudent. Unforced errors, however, and a lack-lustre campaign saw them lose office by a whisker. Bertie Ahern formed a minority government, on apparently shaky foundations, including four independent TDs. Many, including some prominent in the outgoing government, didn’t think it could last until Christmas. In the event it was 14 long years before Kenny, Burton, Noonan and Howlin enjoyed a second coming. They have no intention of letting go again.