Politicians should stop playing to the gallery, and usher in reform
THERE is much to recommend a media blackout of politics for the next few weeks, and in the national interest.
Many years ago, as a young reporter sent up to Belfast to cover the interminable Northern talks, I used to stand outside in freezing conditions, and fume about how incredibly long the latest round of talks was taking.
The party leaders would come outside and offer the media pack morsels of information, which would be parsed and analysed for hours, if not days after.
In fairness, the stakes were high, in terms of human life, not to mention the historical baggage around the table, but with a little less media attention at crucial junctures, the process might have wound up considerably sooner.
It is now two weeks since the general election. I’ve written previously about the need to allow the politicians time and space to deal with the vastly different landscape. They could do with a little less airtime and public agonising, and a little more knuckling down to the situation at hand.
As they sort out what sort of relationship they intend having, what they can keep up-front and public is the reform of the political system. Reform has been bandied about by politicians from all sides as being of the utmost importance. They are correct; it is.
The FF’ers and FG’ers have been war-gaming in private, and on the airwaves, on the least electorally damaging way for them to be in power, or, indeed, out of it. They would do well to remember that if they fail to do something substantial, in changing how their daily interactions are carried out in Leinster House, in what is the shop window for national politics, it will have serious repercussions not just for how politics is viewed, but also for how they fare electorally in the future.
Now is the time to break out of the non-virtuous circle of the Dail as an impotent talking shop.
The suggestion that an all-party committee should propose Dail reform within a month makes good sense. They only worry is that momentum would be lost, as things heat up on government formation. This must not be allowed to happen.
The problem is that the two issues are inextricably linked. Fianna Fail took the initiative on reform, just after the election result, and have had Fine Gael on the back foot since.
It didn’t seem possible that the abysmal levels of trust between the two parties could sink any lower, but that is what has happened in the past two weeks.
On the Fine Gael side, they listen to Fianna Fail TDs, such as Willie O’Dea, talking about how the days of a “winner takes all” democracy are over, and how this is the era of “participatory democracy”. The problem is that they do not believe a word of it. They see it as typical FF blather, in advance of a power grab. They feel battered after the election result and roundly outsmarted. They’re not against the principle of Dail reform, not at all.
They see that it is long overdue and that it would ultimately benefit politics. But they are also seriously conflicted. They see it as a big stick that FF would beat them with, if they end up in a minority Government and relying on FF for support.
An example would be an FG minister bringing legislation to a Dail committee, and then being seen to be constantly brought to heel by Fianna Fail.
But if this is a brave new world they are facing, then they have to face it with courage. If, as they suspect and dread, Fianna Fail are operating a self-serving agenda, that could become pretty apparent, pretty quickly, with a new, open politics.
For those of us who have been observing Irish politics for a long time, the notion of such openness seems mind-boggling, indeed, culturally head-bending. If the Swedes are on one end of the spectrum when it comes to openness in their public life, then we are at the opposite end. It would involve ‘cute-hoorism’ being left at the front door of Leinster House. Imagine, though, a contentious issue such as health being dealt with by a Dail committee, and on a largely consensual, open basis.
Much of what has gone wrong with our health system rests with local politicking being practised by national politicians. A different approach could bring about success rather than failure, in something like the number of people on trollies in our hospital emergency departments.
The time has come for these changes to be made. The public hunger is there for it. It is a very necessary part of the maturing of our politics. But it is a huge leap, not least in the type of behaviour we witness in the Dail. As Independent TD, Maureen O’Sullivan, said in her pitch to be elected Ceann Comhairle yesterday, the shouting-down and interruption make the Dail look more like a coliseum than a parliament.
A different way of working might not seem as exciting, she said, or might not make headlines or good television, but would be a better working parliament. She hit the nail on the head of how our politicians obviously pitch their contribution in the Dail to make the headlines on the RTÉ Six One News.
It’s not just the politicians, either. I’ve lost count of the politicians who’ve said privately that all this change will either not happen, or will subsequently fail, if the media does not play its part, in terms of how it rabble-rouses and baits the political parties.
They also pointed to the lack of media coverage of the majority of the work carried out by Dail committees. This would, hopefully, be sorted by newsworthy action in the committees.
So, after yesterday’s burst of excitement it is time to stop strutting, and to knuckle down to the real business of working out who will govern us; how they will interact with the Dail, and, in turn, the Irish electorate observing the business of the Dail.
It is time, now, for the two protagonists, Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, to get off the airwaves, to take it indoors and “get a room”.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
