Blatant electioneering disingenuous and offensive
And so the caretaker government rolls on with its only aim to take care of winning the next election.
After its complete politicisation of the banking inquiry, where it derided Fianna Fáil for going for short-term gain instead of long-term planning, Fine Gael did exactly the same by making non-decision decisions in a range of areas across the board.
The appearance before the probe of Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Labour leader Joan Burton also exposed the hollowness of their claims that they would not have led the country to disaster as well.
Mr Kenny was particularly shaky when confronted with his party’s 2007 manifesto which bought into the endless growth forecasts and spending frenzy of Fianna Fáil.
Indeed, the only thing Fine Gael and Labour got right in this period was to manage to lose the 2007 election and thus avoid the blame for a crash worsened by a decade of Fianna Fáil mistakes.
Mistakes of short termism, Mr Kenny and co have promised to never make again – oh, unless there is a tricky election around the corner, then they avoid anything difficult, keep the head down and pump out as much good news as possible.
The Fair Deal scheme was a prime example of this. After years of delaying a decision, the Government decided to delay changes yet again until, conveniently, after the next general election. So, eligibility will remain the same, as will the upper threshold of people only having to surrender up to 7.5% of their assets – for now.
This, like the decision to abandon property tax rises, is squarely aimed at securing Fine Gael’s middle class voter base, as raising that threshold to British-style levels where elderly people needing help have to sell their homes in some cases to receive State care, would mean attacking the inheritance expectations of key voters.
Just a week after the hollow so-called National Economic Dialogue where Mr Kenny insisted he would plan for 20 years ahead, the time bomb of elderly care costs has been left to tick away so someone else can deal with the explosion.
How a society takes care of its most vulnerable members, such as the elderly, is a true measure of its worth, and forcing older people to sacrifice more of their assets to help pay for better quality help may not be ideal, but how else can the dramatic rise in senior citizens be realistically paid for?
Within nine years, the number of people needing Fair Deal will rise by 9,000 to 34,000, and in the same period those aged 65 and over will have rocketed by a third to more than 800,000.
But Mr Kenny is not interested in nine years’ time, but nine months’ time – the last point at which he can hold an election.
So, the caretaker government strategy is to get through to the October budget and make it as generous as possible, but without being too politically vulgar with the cash available.
Then, the Coalition will have to decide whether to hold a snap November poll, or keep going until early March, by which time the USC tax cuts will have shown up in pay packets.
Both options contain their own risks: How can Mr Kenny justify an early poll when he has always insisted he will go full term? Or go full term and risk winter chaos in the health service, and possibly losing control of events as the Government did with the IBRC deals controversy and Cronygate?
An earlier poll would also likely sink the banking inquiry which will cease when the present Dáil does.
But then as it has failed to throw the dirt at Fianna Fáil that the Coalition hoped, maybe they have already abandoned that avenue of attack.
For all his comedic histrionics when challenging the Taoiseach and Pat Rabbitte, Fianna Fáil Senator Marc Mac Sharry was the only one who made Mr Kenny uncomfortable, and had a valid point when he questioned why, if this was all just a non-party political truth-seeking exercise, the Government moved political heaven and Earth to ensure it maintained its in-built majority on the probe.
Despite the best efforts of chairperson Ciarán Lynch, the committee has been hampered by a deadly combination of poor questioning and all too evasive answers, which is why the prospect of David Drumm appearing before them presents such a tantalising dilemma.
The crash of a Drumm solo would be the big box office event of the inquiry and make the interventions of Unbelievable Bertie and Calamity Cowen look like the sideshows they were. Drumm was so enmeshed in the web of what went wrong, his insights could illuminate many darkened corners.
But to allow him to give evidence on his terms via a video link from his self-imposed exile in the US when he continues to resist calls to force him back to Ireland will be seen as validating his decision to stay away.
It could also compromise any potential court proceedings he might be involved in. The committee would be foolish to choose such short-term impact over its long-term credibility.
That would be to take a leaf out of the Enda and Bertie playbook of politics.
Indeed, Mr Kenny aped Ahern by taking the Cabinet on a nice photo-friendly day trip to a country house so the caretaker government could fake care by re-announcing empty promises on aspirational childcare that never seems to become policy.
Obviously, all Governments are obsessed with winning elections and maintaining power, but when it is being done in such a nakedly blatant way, just please do not pretend you are better than what has gone before.
Enda chose Lissadell House for his ministerial mini-break so as to bathe in a spot of Yeats, and to twist the poet’s words to describe the much abused voter: “Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy.”
In political terms, the election run-up is the nearest we get to a feeling anything approaching joy, the abiding tragedy, the inevitable aftermath when the short-term chicken decisions come home to wreck the roost.
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