Edging slowly towards an accidental election
LAST Thursday week, we got a glimpse of the future. Minister Leo Varadkar stood in for Leaders’ Questions and performed with aplomb, much to the delight of his squad of young cheerleaders on Fine Gael’s backbenches.
Forty-eight hours after Varadkar set Fine Gael hearts a-fluttering, his leader made the point that he is going nowhere soon.
Enda Kenny, Taoiseach of five and a half years’ standing, told reporters at his party’s annual presidential dinner that he will be around for a long time yet.
Crucial to knowing exactly how long this very unstable, barely functioning minority Government will last; reliant on the acquiescence of Fianna Fáil for its survival, in the wake of Kenny’s comments, people are now beginning to ask the question — just when will Micheál Martin pull the plug and force an election?
Five months into the ‘Confidence and Supply’ agreement which has committed Fianna Fáil to facilitate three budgets, all is not sitting comfortably with the Soldiers of Destiny.
There are some within the party who feel they have no choice but to hold their nerve and see out the agreement until 2018. They argue that the party is fishing in the same pool of people as Fine Gael, who reward responsible behaviour.
If the party came across as trying to be too cute by half, it would backfire on it, several senior TDs told me.
While many within Fianna Fáil feel that as long as Kenny stays around, the Confidence and Supply agreement is tenable, some are beginning to say that even a Varadkar accession to the top job could be stomached.
“Leo as Taoiseach would be severely muzzled and would not be the shining star he is to some at present. He did nothing in health and being Taoiseach is health times 10 in terms of pressure,” said the TD.
But other senior TDs think differently. They believe any reward for being responsible and propping up Fine Gael will be short-lived because sooner or later they will get blamed for the mistakes being made.
“You’ll get a bit of credit for a while, but after that you get blamed. It is a hard place for us to be in,” one TD told me.
“Whether it is Leo or Simon Coveney who takes over, the risk is, do you allow the new leader to bed in?
“The natural position is to think that is political madness to do that, and that’s why this thing can’t last. One more budget or you become their whipping boy,” said the TD.
They argue that ‘Confidence and Supply’ isn’t working for the country or for Fianna Fáil.
“A drowning man can bring his rescuer down,” quipped one TD, saying an election is likely by next April or May.
Even those arguing the long game can see a number of potential pitfalls that could see the country plunged again into an accidental election which nobody wants.
It is virtually in the gift of Martin to call time on this ramshackle Dáil when he sees fit, but a number of matters could force his hand.
Firstly, in the coming weeks, Fianna Fáil TDs will have to vote for Government proposals at committee stages on the Finance Bill and the Social Welfare Bill.
This is because, were they to abstain as they have in the Dáil, the Government would be tied with the Opposition and on that basis, proposed new measures would fall.
Such direct support for the Government’s measures only reinforces the negatives of the deal, whereby the party gets the blame for the measures, but none of the benefits of office.
Secondly, the next big issue to be addressed is what to do with water charges.
All sides concur that given the pronounced gulf between the official Fine Gael position that water charges must be reintroduced, and the official Fianna Fáil position that they should be abolished, there are risks of an early election.
The problem for Fianna Fáil is that the party is divided greatly on the issue of water and the abolition stance proposed by Martin does not sit comfortably with some of his chief lieutenants, including Michael McGrath, the party’s finance spokesman, and Barry Cowen, who are known to have privately advocated a different way of paying for water.
While the Fianna Fáil submission to the new Water Commission was “flexible enough” in what it was proposing, there is a feeling that Martin’s public commentary hardened the party’s stance, and to some has backed them into a “very dangerous corner”.
“The water issue is a very dangerous one. We don’t want to fall into an election, and ideally we should try to get the issue off the agenda as soon as possible,” said one TD.
The difficulty is that as things stand, while the party’s abolitionist stance on water charges may have temporarily muted some elements on the hard left, few believe it is tenable and will deliver votes at the end of the day.
The party’s stance has placed it on a collision course not just with Fine Gael, but with the European Union. Ireland has by law to charge for water usage on the principle of the polluter pays.
Abolishing charges would place the country in direct contravention of the European directive, meaning fines amounting to many millions of euro.
Another big reason why we could end up having an accidental election is because the Dáil isn’t working.
Having been the lead advocate for Dáil reform, Martin last week wrote a letter of complaint to Ceann Comhairle Seán Ó Fearghaíl, saying Independents and smaller parties were getting an unfair amount of speaking time at his expense.
As my colleague Fiachra Ó Cionnaith reported in this paper, Martin said it is unfair that his party is allocated the same speaking time as other Opposition parties.
He said the current allocation is not proportionate to the number of elected representatives and “subsumes many hours of parliamentary debate unnecessarily”.
“I do not think it is fair when the Dáil is doing statements that I as leader of the main Opposition party get the same time allocated as Sinn Féin, Labour, Social Democrats, Green Party, AAA or PBP as well as other groupings,” he said.
Such an imbalance is causing great strife for Martin, as was his solo run last week which saw the mid-term break cancelled, even though his own whip Michael Moynihan agreed to it at the Dail’s business committee, which decides the order of sittings.
Martin’s fit of outrage at the break annoyed the hell out of some of his own colleagues but also damaged the already brittle relationship with Fine Gael.
It has also been suggested that while Martin could stomach Leo becoming leader in the short run, given he shares a constituency with Simon Coveney, he would not be able to swallow him becoming top dog.
“Micheál’s ego would not tolerate Coveney becoming Taoiseach. All politics is local at the end of the day and that almost certainly would mean an election,” said one TD.
The general feeling is that while people do not want an election, a growing unhappiness with how politics is operating at present means we could be back to the polls before we know it.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
