Decentralisation plan - McCreevy's legacy on back burner

NO sooner had the knife been slipped into Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy's back than the Government's decentralisation plan began to unravel at the seams.

Bereft of his stubborn certitude, fellow ministers are suddenly finding decentralisation too hot a potato to handle.

Plans to move civil servants down the country will soon be long-fingered. Ill-conceived and badly packaged, it is a ticking time bomb that could blow the Government's re-election hopes out of the water. Nor, as evidenced by Fianna Fáil's devastating election performance, was the electorate duped.