Fianna Fail backbenchers were flapping around like ducks in thunder at Leinster House yesterday, advising anyone who cared to listen that the electorate had been driven mad by Charlie McCreevy's budget.
Not only that, some of their own cumainn members were refusing to canvass for them at election time unless there was a change in policy towards stay-at-home wives. It was insupportable. It was a dreadful mistake. Their seats were on the line.
The Cabinet was meeting in extended session to consider the issue. But the TDs weren't hanging around for any white smoke. As far as they were concerned, the Government would not have to wait for Independent TDs to tell them what was what. They themselves would fulfil that role. The message was unambiguous: there would have to be change and it was back to the drawing board for the Minister for Finance.
By mid-afternoon, as many as 20 Fianna Fail backbenchers had lined up to provide RTE with sound bites in which they joined the Minister of State Mr Eamon O Cuiv in parading their credentials as supporters of "family values" and women in the home. Some of them took a leaf out of SIPTU's book and talked about the need to provide larger tax allowances for the lower paid.
Fianna Fail had not seen the like of it since the party split over the leadership of Charlie Haughey in the early 1980s. It was so extensive that opposition TDs began to smell a rat. And Pat Rabbitte wondered whether the whole thing was being quietly orchestrated to take the sting out of public anger.
Friction was also said to have surfaced at cabinet, where beleaguered ministers looked for protection against a risen public. But they got little comfort from Mr McCreevy. And Mary Harney was also hanging tough, having gone on RTE, last Monday, to declare that "the budget was not and is not a mistake". Changes would have to be carefully orchestrated. And the Minister for Finance would have to be seen to be in charge. Anything else could develop into a resigning issue.
Bertie Ahern does things in his own inimitable way. Over the last few days, the Taoiseach could clearly hear the dogs in the street not just barking, but trying to break down the door. And so he bought a little time and tried to drive a wedge between the demands of SIPTU for the lower paid and the emotional issue of women in the home.
Fighting on two fronts at the same time is a mug's game. And the Taoiseach is no mug.
After referring the issues to a Cabinet sub-committee for further consideration, in advance of today's Fianna Fail parliamentary party meeting, the Taoiseach went to make soothing noises in the Dail. He recognised the Government would have to be "attentive to the balance that needs to be preserved between spouses who work outside the home and spouses who bring up children or care for dependants at home". There had to be a sense of fairness involving carers in the home and the low-paid and other disadvantaged categories.
Implicitly accepting the lack of balance in Mr McCreevy's exercise, the Taoiseach promised to "achieve the necessary balance" over the next two budgets and said this work would be subject to "both political discussion in the government and negotiation with the social partners".
Just to show that his heart was in the right place, Mr Ahern accepted the recent NESC report on behalf of the Government, but suggested the pace of implementation was something that would have to be discussed with the social partners. This would involve a "high priority" being given to increasing personal tax allowances; a "significant priority" being given to raising the threshold at which people became liable to the top rate of tax and new measures on childcare.
John Bruton and Ruairi Quinn kicked up merry hell, objecting to the way the Government was ordering Dail business so as to avoid a pre-Christmas vote. They wanted to put pressure on the Independents and to challenge Fianna Fail backbenchers to "put up or shut up". But they got no change from the Taoiseach.
While the Opposition parties railed about the unfairness of the Budget and tried to land a telling punch on the coalition Government, Fianna Fail backbenchers were still wondering how, with so much money to give away, the Minister for Finance had got it so wrong.
Of course there is the economic argument. The need to respond to the promptings of IBEC and get more women back to work. But the Budget went beyond that. It recognised "a new social reality" and specifically targeted single people and double income families for special largesse.
In that context, forget about social equity. Forget about bleeding heart liberals. Think politics. Think an overall Dail majority. And shape your budget to capture the votes of the two most volatile groups in society: single people and young, two-income married couples.
Recent opinion polls have shown that Fianna Fail is hoovering up support from persons in the 18-24 age group. Its share of that vote comes to 58 per cent, compared to 18 per cent for Fine Gael and 9 per cent for the Labour Party. And the message is little different in the 2534 year cohort. Fianna Fail gets 53 per cent support, compared to 21 per cent for Fine Gael and 13 per cent for Labour.
The problem is that many people in these age groups simply do not vote. So you inject a little self-interest into the equation - like special tax breaks that go well beyond what might be expected - and you hope for some positive recognition in the next election.
With Northern Ireland on track, the party could expect a lift in the polls. And if a young vote could be grafted onto that, there was no knowing what could be achieved. But, with a scheduled election so far away, it wasn't easy to justify. Especially when the old social reality, in the shape of women in the home, was raising blue murder.
Having failed to sell his original Budget message, Mr McCreevy may make a better fist of it today when he meets Fianna Fail TDs.
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