There was a touch of McCreevy magic about the Development FinanceAgency idea, writes Denis Coghlan, Chief Political Correspondent
Fianna Fáil's big idea for the general election is to establish a National Development Finance Agency that will raise money and ensure value for money under the National Development Plan. Its structures and powers have yet to be legislated for, but the general intention is that the agency will perform functions at present centred in the Department of Finance while keeping borrowing artificially low.
The storm that shook the world following the collapse of Enron clearly did not colour Fianna Fáil thinking, as Bertie Ahern had no hesitation in explaining what the scheme was all about. Funds raised by the new agency through the sale of bonds would not qualify as government borrowing if the projects generated an economic return, he said.
And there was the possibility of getting national pension funds in through the back door because both he and Mr McCreevy would like to see the National Treasury Management Agency making those funds available to its proposed subsidiary for viable infrastructural projects.
Fianna Fáil was boxing clever. The Labour Party was going to borrow and reduce contributions to the national pension fund in order to pay for health and infrastructure. The Progressive Democrats would borrow and sell State companies to fund the same exercise through a National Transformation Fund. But Fianna Fáil would borrow/sell bonds in what the Taoiseach described as an innovative and creative approach.
Of the three options, the Fianna Fáil scheme was probably the least likely to frighten the horses. But all three plans were close enough to ensure they wouldn't form an impenetrable barrier to the formation of a new coalition government.
Details of Fianna Fáil's spending and borrowing plans, if returned to government, will be revealed later today by Mr McCreevy. But Mr Ahern said enough to make it clear that current Coalition spending of 14.5 per cent was unsustainable and would have to be cut back to 8 per cent from next year.
The devil will be in the detail of that promise. For the Minister for Finance will have to wrestle with conflicting pressures from a rolling 10-per-cent pay bill increase and a benchmarking process that is likely to further fuel public pay when it is published in June.
The other issue that had journalists champing at the bit was Fianna Fáil's plan for health spending. Mr Ahern was reassurance itself. The party was totally committed to the National Health Strategy over a 10-year period. As for funding that capital programme, the National Development Finance Agency might be able to raise €2 billion in bonds or borrowing, or the private sector might become involved.
The detail of the Fianna Fáil manifesto spoke only, however, of "a co-ordinated multi-annual programme of service development" and referred to €49 million invested in service development this year. And just in case anybody thought Mr McCreevy had given up trying to secure better value for money, his Department issued a statement - four hours after the official manifesto launch - announcing the details of a new Commission on Financial Management and Control in the health services.
The commission has been asked to report, before the end of the year, on a recent, very critical, value-for-money audit in the health services. That work by the commission may well decide the level of funding, reform and development that will take place. After all, there are losers in any political equation.
For, while a five-year Fianna Fáil pledge to extend medical health cards to an extra 200,000 people was given, no mention was made of the 157,000 people who lost cover between 1996 and this year.
Having got the issues of health and borrowing out of the way, the Taoiseach luxuriated in the achievements of Government over the past five years.
Unemployment and taxes had been cut dramatically. Peace had been secured in Northern Ireland. Crime had fallen by 27 per cent. And pensions and social welfare payments had been increased.
If the electorate wanted more of the same, Mr Ahern intimated, it should vote for Fianna Fáil. There were promises in many other areas, from agriculture and rural development, to transport, the environment and sport. And, the Taoiseach insisted, they could all be funded on the basis of existing growth and revenue projections.
The 86-page election manifesto was reassuring and soft-focus, recording many achievements from the glory days of the Celtic Tiger and offering further progress and rising living standards as the economy continued to grow.
As an attractive and non-threatening package, it will take some beating.