Irish Examiner view: Voters alert for empty promises

How much of the parties’ individual proposals will survive the formation of government remains to be seen 

When the people have spoken, the political parties — or at least those who’ve gathered enough votes and seats in the Dail — sit down to discuss a programme for government, their individual election vows will be distilled down into what is a pragmatic, practical and workable future plan. Picture: Ruin Vieira/PA

As election day draws closer, voters will need to have their wits about them as an ever-longer list of promises come tumbling out of each party’s candidates, with splurges on everything from newborn babies to crime task forces, from abolishing student fees to taxes on jets.

A familiar thread of incentivised attention-grabbing give-ways, the likes of which we have not seen since the glory (gory?) days of Charlie McCreevy and Brian Cowen, appears to have partially enlivened a campaign which had seemed enmeshed in a never-ending round of proposed solutions to the housing crisis.