Mick Clifford: Political outrage over housing crisis doesn't extend to Dáil's Easter break

Easter recess will be a break from all the faux outrage and attempted public shaming

 Sinn Féin's Louise O’Reilly TD used the housing crisis to attack Green Party junior minister Joe O'Brien.

The ending of the eviction ban is an emotional subject, as one consequence will be the expected dispatch of some individuals and families to emergency accommodation due to the housing crisis. 

It was an appalling decision, principally because no preparation was made, no mitigating features put in place, ahead of the announcement. The failure to prepare smacks of incompetence and a political misstep. 

However, the anger of empathy from opposition politicians has been a sight to behold. They would have you believe that they have a monopoly on compassion, and the members of government parties are behaving with wanton cruelty towards people who are living at the sharp end of the housing emergency. In reality, the Government had an unpalatable decision to make and arguably they made the wrong one. That doesn’t render them cruel and heartless, but such is how it is being portrayed by elements of the opposition and their supporters, particularly but not exclusively online.

Agree or disagree with the ban — and a poll last weekend suggests opinion on it divides roughly down the middle of society — presenting it as a barometer of compassion and capacity for human empathy is cheap. For instance, Sinn Féin’s solution to the ending of the ban is to delay it until next January. Certainly, that makes more sense, and, with the correct measures in place, would ensure fewer people would be exposed to the possibility of homelessness. Or maybe not. But whichever way it turned out, are they really trying to suggest that their approach would eliminate the possibility of some renters being pushed towards emergency accommodation?

Probably the most illustrative example of the faux outrage occurred during the debate on March 29 on a Sinn Féein motion to reverse the ending of the ban. The party’s frontbencher Louise O’Reilly told the house a constituent, a widow with four children, is faced with the possibility of having to leave her home. She addressed her remarks directly at Joe O’Brien, her constituency colleague and a Green Party junior minister.

“Where is she going, Joe?” O’Reilly asked, her voice heavy with emotion. “You used to work in the homeless services. You know how bad it is. Where is she going, Joe? She’s your neighbour, she’s my neighbour. Where is she going to go, a widow and four children? You have no answers.”

The subtext was obvious. You used to have compassion Joe, and then you went into government. Look at you now. 

We were invited to conclude that Deputy O’Reilly was overcome with compassion, while Minister O’Brien had sold his soul and with it any capacity for empathy 

This was the standard of political debate on a serious issue.

Anyway, the atmosphere of faux high emotion spread to all sides last weekend when Sinn Féin housing spokesperson Eoin O Broin issued his ill-judged tweet. The tweet depicting gardai superimposed on a famine-era eviction caused, well, both outrage and outrage at the outrage. (As somebody responsible for issuing a few ill-judged tweets myself I could only view the whole affair from behind knotted fingers).

Some in the government immediately spotted an opportunity to meet emotional fire with emotional fire. The Minister for Justice Simon Harris adopted his best Richard Mulcahy pose and wondered aloud what would befall the poor, benighted nation if Sinn Féin ever got into government. He was completely outdone by junior minister Patrick O’Donovan, who brought fulmination to new, previously unseen heights on Claire Byrne’s radio show.

People Before Profit issued a release describing the Fine Gael reaction as “pearl clutching”. They were mad as hell about the government being mad as hell about the tweet. There is a rumour that between midnight on Sunday and 6am on Monday nobody in People Before Profit was mad at all.

Sinn Féin TD Paul Donnolly wasn’t having any of the pearl-clutching. “If a piece of art upsets you more than lifting of the eviction ban (even for cancer patients and 80 yr old people) then you really need to look at yourself,” he said. The moral high ground was retaken. Which of the two options “upset” you the most indicated what exactly was your capacity for compassion. You couldn’t simply suggest that both were ill-judged and did no favours to respective political objectives.

So the Easter recess will be a break from all the faux outrage, claiming a monopoly on compassion and attempted public shaming. 

Of course in a grown-up democracy, there would be no recess this year

 Legislation that we are told is central to putting in place measures to mitigate the effects of ending the ban has to wait for two weeks until all the boys and girls return. This is happening in the midst of a genuine emergency in housing, but there has been no outrage about taking time off when expedient action is required. Maybe they are all just too emotionally drained.