Budget 2017: Heavy dollop of pragmatism saw three-parent budget succeed

JUST weeks after the first baby was born using a “three-parent” technique in Mexico we’ve managed the almost similarly amazing feat of the three-parent budget here.

If you’d put forward this possibility even 12 months ago it would have appeared almost as fanciful. However, it has happened, and with the minimum amount of fuss.

It may have been borne out of necessity, and a self-serving desire on the parts of all involved not to have a general election, but the important point is that it happened. Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, and the Independents managed to put together a spending plan that will see us through the next year.

For the cynics who would dismiss “new” politics this is an excellent example of what can be done when it needs to be done. Yes, there was a heavy dollop of pragmatism from all involved here.

There was also a serious level of dilution necessary in satisfying all sides so much that any strong policy taste was lost. The amounts involved were fairly trifling. But it would be wrong to dismiss the achievement and the politicians involved deserve credit.

Of course, we have had shapes being thrown over recent weeks. Fianna Fáil set themselves up as the champions of the elderly and Fine Gael played them at their own game by insisting that you cannot benefit one vulnerable group while you ignore others.

Minister Paschal Donohoe announced an extra €5 per week on the state pension, demanded by Fianna Fáil, but added in his speech that in framing a “fair budget” it was not right to stop there.

No. FG was also concerned for carers, the unemployed, those living with disabilities, who “may not have the loudest voices” but whose needs are no less real. All weekly social welfare payments would be increased by the same amount.

In a funny way the manoeuvring of the two parties almost cancelled each other out in terms of gaining political supremacy. The shared ownership was reflected, conversely, in the lack of traditional applause usually given by the TDs whose party or parties have just presented the budget and give their man a clap after he has sat down.

But that is not all that was different. To anyone familiar with the usual budget day palaver it seemed downright odd to watch Fianna Fáil’s Michael McGrath, as opposition finance spokesman, stand up and fail to launch a full frontal assault on what he’s just heard in the budget speeches. Indeed within minutes he was echoing Paschal Donohoe’s words uttered as the minister was bringing his own speech to a conclusion. “Those of us in the middle ground of politics,” the minister told the assembled deputies, “have a duty to show that co-operation and consensus can work. To show that our tone can be moderate but still convincing. To show that things won’t just fall apart and the centre can hold — and stay firm.”

Michael McGrath repeated those thoughts on the middle ground, and “how vital it is the centre holds” as the two biggest parties in Irish politics — neck and neck at 26% in the recent IPSOS MRBI poll for The Irish Times — unite against Sinn Féin, PBP, and the others on the Left.

It was clear Michael McGrath saw little point in pretending that this was anything but a new and odd situation. Fianna Fáil did not write this budget, or get everything it wanted, but it had influenced it as best they could from the outside. He pointed out that way in which this budget had come about was the upshot of how people had voted in the general election.

That point is only partly true — the partnership government was one option, the other was a Fine Gael/Fianna Fáil coalition. Looking at the pair of them yesterday it was very tempting to ponder on what might have been, and how much more stable things could have been for the country with such a union.

Yesterday had an anti-climactic quality. For years we were subjected to the rabbit-out-of-the-hat approach from the minister for finance of the day. They’d hear the details in the German parliament before we would. It would work in the Government’s favour during the good times, and had the opposite effect during the austerity years.

But it also served to continue the infantilising approach our politics has traditionally had towards the Irish voters, not to mention the lobbying frenzy that traditionally ensued as various interest group tried to influence government decisions behind closed doors.

Without doubt the relative ease with which this year’s budgetary process has been dispensed with also has to do with the how late the Dáil returned after the summer recess, but also crucially the long hours and days spent by Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, and the Independents as they hammered out the agreement on this new way of operating a partnership government.

The Committee on Budgetary Oversight was only established in July and did some good work, but clearly can have a far greater role next year. The addition of the Independent Budget Oversight Office would only strengthen the process in future.

The third “parent” involved in this budget was the Independents. Transport Minister Shane Ross claimed it was their influence that benefitted senior citizens, as well as ensuring that preparations for Brexit are upped.

But it was Minister for Children Katherine Zappone who achieved way and above the best result, not just among her own Independent colleagues, but the entire Cabinet. Throughout yesterday afternoon and evening she was being heaped with plaudits from colleagues on all political sides.

She tweeted: “Today we will set a course to turn one of the most expensive childcare systems in the world into the best”.

Today we will set a course to turn one of the most expensive childcare systems in the world into the best #Budget17 #Budget2017

— Katherine Zappone (@k_zappone) October 11, 2016

That sounds ambitious and a tad naïve for a new TD appointed straight into Cabinet, and without the support of a political party behind her. However, the last few months have shown a woman who has clearly adapted quickly to her surroundings and knows a thing or two about political strategy.

In his own speech to the Dáil Finance Minister Michael Noonan, delivering his sixth budget, told of how the economy is in “good shape”. But he also spoke of the need to put in place “economic shock absorbers” to enable us to deploy resources to reduce or eliminate the impact of future economic shocks.

Chief among those, of course, is Brexit — over €1.2bn of goods and services are exchanged between us and the UK on a weekly basis, supporting 400,000 jobs. It was an undoubted achievement to deliver Budget 2017.

However, the unknown quality of future Brexit fallout, potentially catastrophic, could make subsequent budgets far far tougher.