THE FINE Gael-Labour Coalition can celebrate its first anniversary on Friday with a degree of satisfaction about its first 12 months in office. While the huge challenges facing the country haven’t gone away, the Government has made a reasonable start in facing up to them, even though some of the toughest problems have yet to be confronted.
The essential ingredient the Coalition has brought to office is freshness and optimism. It has helped to dispel the sense of despair that gripped the country in the final phase of Fianna Fáil’s 14 years in office.
Much of the credit for the Coalition’s performance has to go to Enda Kenny, who has once again confounded his legion of media critics by displaying a sure touch in the Taoiseach’s office. His unrelenting optimism and good humour have set the tone for the Government’s performance and given the public the confidence to hope that things can get better.
The Taoiseach’s upbeat mood has also played a large part in restoring Ireland’s international reputation both at European level among his fellow heads of government and among international investors.
Wilbur Ross, the American financier who has invested half a billion euro into Bank of Ireland, said in a recent Irish Times interview that Kenny was “a really inspirational speaker”. He remarked that at the Bill Clinton-sponsored Invest in Ireland conference in New York last month, Kenny’s speech had people so “pumped up” they were “ready to run through walls”.
While Irish people tend to be a bit more cynical about high-flown rhetoric from politicians there is no denying how important Kenny’s upbeat attitude has been. He has also shown himself to be no slouch at the verbal jousting in the Dáil when it comes to getting in digs at opponents during exchanges.
The calm assurance of Minister for Finance Michael Noonan has also been an essential ingredient in the Government’s campaign to rebuild a degree of public confidence in the country’s future. One Minister summed up the dynamic thus: “Enda is the front of house garage salesman, out there selling the cars. Noonan is the fella in the overalls greasing the engine down the back.”
A key relationship in any coalition is that between taoiseach and tánaiste. Kenny and Eamon Gilmore have worked harmoniously in the first year and managed to avoid the tension that damaged the capacity of previous Fine Gael-Labour governments to operate efficiently in the past.
The establishment of the Economic Management Council, which involves the Taoiseach and Tánaiste and the two Ministers at the Department of Finance meeting a number of times every week, has played a very important role in keeping the Government cohesive.
Gilmore came in for some criticism because his profile slipped at times due to his Foreign Affairs commitments but his strengths as a debater have been an important asset to the Coalition in the Dáil and will be crucial in the European treaty referendum campaign.
While three Labour Party TDs have gone overboard since the Coalition took office, no serious splits have opened up in the party. For two of the departing TDs, Tommy Broughan and Patrick Nulty, last December’s budget was a step too far, while Willie Penrose resigned the whip over the closure of Mullingar barracks.
The party’s national conference in Galway next month will give an indication of the mood at grassroots level but there are no indications of the internecine strife that gripped the party when it was last in government at a time of economic recession in the 1980s.
On the Fine Gael side one TD, Denis Naughten, departed over the Roscommon hospital issue but the parliamentary party has been buoyed by the performance of its leader during the first year and the factionalism that marred its final year in opposition has evaporated.
Yet for all the harmony in both parties at the end of year one, there is a suspicion that relations have remained smooth only because the Government has shirked some of the really tough decisions that will determine whether the country emerges from the economic crisis sooner rather than later.
The big failure has been on jobs, the issue both parties identified as critical during the general election campaign a year ago. Richard Bruton has come up with a detailed and comprehensive policy to foster job creation but the major budgetary decisions have not matched his ambition. The capital programme, which has huge job creation potential, was cut savagely in 2012 to ensure the pay and pensions of public servants would continue to be protected under the Croke Park agreement.
There was a similar lack of ambition on sectoral labour agreements, even though the courts had created an opening for decisive action, while long overdue labour activation measures are being developed with painful slowness.
The Coalition has been more successful in getting to grips with the public finances and the banking crisis but that has largely involved implementing policies already in place when it took power. The Government got lucky with a modification of the bailout terms in its first few months in office but it now needs to get the deal on the bank debt to be sure of winning the referendum on the European treaty.
The loss of that referendum could prove fatal to the long-term prospects of the Coalition and, more importantly, to the long-term prospects of the country. Delivering a Yes vote is essential and it will be a real test of the Government’s mettle. Its handling of the announcement of the decision to hold a referendum was assured but it will need to display the same level of assurance for the duration of the campaign.
The defeat on the constitutional amendment to give more power to parliamentary committees last October was a salutary lesson in how a referendum campaign can go wrong. The Coalition won’t have to be reminded that Brian Cowen’s ability to lead the country was destroyed by the No vote to the Lisbon Treaty which happened less than two months after he took office. It also undermined international confidence in Ireland at a critical time in the country’s history.
The referendum will be a real test of the Coalition but success should provide it with the necessary confidence to take the tough decisions required in next year’s budget. Real reform of the welfare system and a determined attempt to reduce the public service pay and pensions bill are crucial. Restoring confidence was the most important first step but there is still a long way to go.
Failures
* Tax on private pension fund
* Failure to make dent in jobless figures
* Loss of four TDs, (3 Labour, 1 Fine Gael)
Successes
* Honouring tax pledges
* Getting change of the bailout terms
* Kenny’s performance ie: speech on the church