Nobody wants to be left standing when the Brexit music finally stops

Last night at Westminster saw the end of the beginning of Brexit. The beginning of the end is not in sight yet, however.

How long it takes and what shape it comes in is still for the future.

Postponement beyond March 29, if it happens, is simply that. Clarity remains beyond the horizon for now.

Time is an incredibly powerful instrument of policy and politics.

For business, the certainly required for major investment decisions remains on a slipping timeline.

A lot won’t happen on the basis that if you don’t know what to do, do nothing. That is a cost to business, an opportunity cost to the economy and a powerful influencer politically.

Since October 9 last, which was budget day, the Government has, where practicable, been run on the basis of ensuring the Taoiseach has maximum flexibility to decide on an election sooner rather than later if desired.

He may not in the end so desire. But decisions are parsed tactically to strategically give him headroom to go to the country at a time of his choosing.

There has been strong feeling in Fine Gael for some time that current arrangements are unfit for purpose. I strongly disagree — but that’s irrelevant.

The constant scurrying for every vote every time and the dual indignity of cajoling the Independent Alliance while consulting Fianna Fáil is wearing for some.

Some among those 28 Fine Gael ministers now, who will not be ministers again when they are unburdened of current arrangements, will remember these belatedly as the good old days. But that, too, is still for the future.

On this the day after the night before, the question is how timelines on Brexit will stretch out and in what direction.

What influence will that use of time have on the opportunity, if it is to be availed of, for the Taoiseach to opt for an election?

Will there now be a clear window to go to the people, to say that an outcome on Brexit is decided on, and in circumstances where he has delivered for Ireland, say it is time to ask for a new mandate?

The temptation to do so, should circumstances allow, are enormous.

The thoughts of being in government next winter, facing problems in health and housing that haven’t gone away, notwithstanding the money and political capital spent on them bring to mind Napoleon’s winter in Moscow.

Even the Grande Armée was shattered.

Next winter will be politically difficult on the basis of what is already known. But the fact of time intrudes further.

Having kicked the can on Local Property Tax and carbon tax down the road in one budget already, it is hardly credible to delay substantive decisions again next October.

Regardless of what decisions are made and how they are finessed, someone has to pay something.

Every imposition, however modest, is received as monstrously unfair by the recipient.

Whatever may have been said by the opposition about the need in principle to have either a carbon tax, or a Local Property Tax the actual arrangements decided on will be decried as appalling — the better to arouse indignation.

At any point before next autumn, all of this remains in the future.

The national interest on Brexit aside, the critical issue mulled over today in Government Buildings is whether what comes next comes in time to allow Leo Varadkar effective control over critical timings here politically.

Fianna Fáil, or at least Micheál Martin and most of his TDs, have clearly decided that they want Varadkar in government to face what they hope will be a winter of discontent.

There is also the simpler processes of time, that slowly tarnish every shine.

Whatever they may have thought previously, Sinn Féin must be deeply relieved to be able to avoid the polls for now.

Much is made of the advent of Mary Lou McDonald and the setback for her party in the presidential election.

I am not sure she is the issue. It may be that the departure of Gerry Adams, coupled with the death of Martin McGuinness, left a fundamental identity crisis.

It is too soon to say. But if the presidential election was a trial run, local and European elections on May 24 will be the real thing.

If she delivers, then she has answered her critics. If not, permanent damage will have been done.

Labour especially must be deeply grateful for the hope of local elections before a general election.

A general election that could easily further reduce its seven seats would put it, along with the SDLP, into the hands of undertakers, to be interred with names including the Progressive Democrats and Clann na Poblachta.

A local poll before a general election is another last change and a deeply welcome one.

All of this is because of Brexit. Without it, I am absolutely sure that we would be already at the other side of a general election.

Its impact on eventual outcomes politically here won’t be clear for some time. But the context for the conduct of politics, and the calibration of choices now is explicitly down to Brexit.

Micheál Martin said as much when he opted to continue with the current arrangement for another budget. So did Leo Varadkar when he responded by explicitly ruling out an election.

Today, nobody knows when the Brexit music will stop, but there is increasingly taut positioning to ensure that when it does, he or she is not left standing.

It is not just that our essential national interest hangs on an eventual outcome that still remains unclear.

It is that linked to it political decisions are increasingly hardwired to calculations about the outcome and, specifically, its timing.

Ultimately the onus is on the Taoiseach.

He was elected by his party TDs and senators to get them re-elected and returned to government. He hasn’t yet led his party in a general election.

Should he succeed in the event, the crown of laurels will be his. Fail and ignominy will be instant.

Such shabby, calculating connivance may seem out of place today, in the wake of great events, which are still unresolved and acted out in the great theatre of the House of Commons last night.

But conniving as it is, alongside the calculation of our national interest this morning is an equally, if not more, intense calculation of party political and personal interest.

Nothing influences either more sensitively or, in the end, more substantively political outcomes than time.

The key question is what are the timelines ahead, and what opportunities will they open up or close down?

On that criterion hangs the timing of an election.

On its timing hangs the eventual result.

On that result, rests the future direction of our small state.