Opposition must offer alternatives

THE two main opposition parties are united in a shared opinion that the Fianna Fáil/Progressive Democrats Coalition perpetrated a fraud on the electorate in winning last year’s general election.

It is a view endorsed by most people in the country as, over the first year of their second term in office, the coalition partners have managed to attract odium from all sections of society in a spectacular fashion.

Perceived as having duped the voters by promising that there would be no cutbacks, secret or otherwise, they immediately unleashed a series of cutbacks and stealth taxes on being returned to power.