He is a left of centre republican, will quit politics at 60, has a lot done but agrees he has more to do. Mark Brennock, Chief Political Correspondent, interviewed the Taoiseach yesterday
It's the economy, stupid. He didn't say it in so many words but that is what the Taoiseach believes is at the root of his Government's current low standing in the eyes of the public.
For years, high economic growth allowed the Government to increase spending in all sorts of areas and get things done. Now things are different, he says.
They are indeed. Mr Ahern starts the new Dáil term with his Government's and his personal opinion poll ratings at record low points.
He and his Government have been on the defensive this week over the deal with religious orders on child abuse compensation, and a few weeks ago over the Laffoy resignation. Since re-election they have been relentlessly accused of breaking election promises. During the summer, the Taoiseach received dog's abuse over the Hello! magazine wedding of his daughter.
The Taoiseach acknowledges that the public view of his Government has changed, but puts it down to one fundamental issue: the state of the global economy and its impact in Ireland.
"Times are more difficult for the Government here," he says. "They are more difficult for governments everywhere. In France, Germany and America it's the same. We had very high economic growth for a number of years and that gave us an opportunity to push on with the infrastructural agenda and the agenda in many other areas.
"Now it's more difficult. Economic growth has moved effectively from 12.5 per cent in the first quarter of 2001 to 1.5 per cent now. That puts the pressure on us. We are half a billion down in revenue this year and last year it was more or less the same.
"That's feeding into the psyche of people. People are having a tougher time. There is less overtime, less bonuses, more uncertainty and people are concerned. Governments naturally get blamed and there are no instant solutions.
"I understand that, I understand people's fears. For us the challenge is to deal with the longer term, we have to manage through these difficult times. We had expenditure growing at 20 per cent, and now we are trying to bring it to a third of that. It's more difficult."
The achievement since last year's election in which he takes greatest satisfaction is the retention of jobs. When economic growth was at 12 per cent, unemployment was at 4.4 per cent, he says. Now the economy is growing at 1.5 per cent and unemployment has moved from just 4.4 per cent to 4.5 per cent.
This "didn't just happen". It was a result of the Government's low-tax policies which attracted employers and gave people more take-home pay.
Asked what he would like the Government to do better, he says it must get more value for money out of capital spending.
"There is no doubt that we are spending the money," he said, remarking that Ireland was spending 5 per cent of GDP - €1.25 billion - this year on infrastructure, more than any other European state.
"We have to try harder to get linked-up Government, to get Departments working together."
He gives the example of the Departments of Environment and Transport working together to change the planning process to speed up projects such as roads or a Dublin Metro, and to curtail the tendency of the costs of all such projects to rise above budget.
"We have huge parts of the country dug up at the moment. I can understand people saying will this crowd ever get it back together again, but we will If you're asking me what I would like to do better I would like to get our act together a bit better to get all these things done and finished."
Mr Ahern acknowledges that more health spending was promised last year than has been delivered. "But we have to do the reforms in health. We are trying to carry 100,000 staff in the health service with us. You can't just get up in the morning and say, 'Here's a reform programme: we're doing it'. It would be grand if you could, if this was a dictatorship, but it's not, it's a democracy."
On health reform the consultation process was over and a project team was working, he said. "We have to press ourselves to do it. It's not a criticism but we just need to get on with it. We are spending the money, we are spending the resources, we know what we need to do and we have to manage the A&E projects and the acute beds situation while we are doing it."
He is, he says, a left of centre republican. Asked was he politically to the right, the left or centre, he said he was a republican. "My philosophy is republicanism and the ethos of a republican is to help people to get to their full abilities."
But was he a left of centre republican or a right of centre republican? "I'm left of centre, I think everybody knows I'm left of centre. But I have a republican ethos which is to give people the best chance of using their abilities."
He appears to be planning to give some people in his party a chance to use their abilities, and long-serving ministers should watch out in the middle of next year. "It's like anything else," he says. "People can work at their maximum for so long and it is a good thing to change around things."
Next year, after the local and European elections and the EU presidency, he will have "a fundamental re-look" at his Cabinet team, he says. He rejects criticism that he is always cautious about moving ministers and promoting newcomers, saying half of the current Cabinet wasn't in his first one in 1997.
The fundamental re-examination would involve a "look at where we are going, how we have performed and what are the issues".
He supports the aim of the Minister for the Environment, Mr Cullen, to increase the upper limit on donations to political parties. He is concerned to ensure there were no favours done in exchange for donations, and that donations were not so large that the donors could expect favours to be done. "I'm not in favour of that, having closed down much of the stuff. I don't want to go back to the days of €100,000 and €50,000 donations.
"But I do think there is some room for extension, but the important thing is that there is disclosure. That's the issue. If we could get a lot of people contributing moderate amounts of money, say €1, 000, I'd be far happier with that."
Yes, he says, he would like to get more money from the religious orders towards the cost of compensating abuse victims, but that might not be possible. "I have to say I think in the end of the day the deal we got was not a bad deal. I'm not saying it was a great deal but it wasn't a bad deal."
He plays down the significance of the controversy over the exclusion of the Attorney General's officials from important meetings with the religious orders. "When we made the decision we had full and comprehensive advice on all the matters that needed to be addressed," he says, praising the input of both Dr Michael Woods and Mr Michael McDowell.
The legal profession, he remarked, "don't make these things easy. I did not believe the day I gave the apology that I was going to be dealing with half the legal profession of Ireland. I actually thought what I was doing was trying to deal with people who were hard done by."
He said there was a danger that in the middle of all the controversy people would lose sight of the main issue. He had set out to compensate those to whom wrong was done and to get a contribution from the religious orders - the agents of the State in whose care the victims had been.
"We have now lost sight of the issue and if we keep doing this it will only be a matter of time before somebody will be on saying you shouldn't have made a deal at all."
On the subject of press regulation, he says the recent coverage of his private life and his involvement in his daughter's wedding will make no difference to his outlook.
On his reaction to that coverage he simply remarks: "I do my best in life but like everyone else I have to sometimes walk around the block before I get calm and cool again."
Mr Ahern favours a statutory press council to regulate press behaviour rather than the self-regulation model favoured by some in the media industry. "We brought in an independent group to regulate us," he says, referring to the Standards in Public Office Commission. "I think the days of self-regulation in society, with all of the competition and regulatory issues, is not a good way.
"Imagine what the public would think of us if I referred Michael Collins [the Fianna Fáil TD found to have had a bogus non-resident bank account] the other day to a Cumann in west Limerick to investigate him.
"It would be the same to refer a newspaper breach to four or five journalists. I do think a statutory press council, legislatively based, should be looked at in this country. Any other one is of no meaning."
As to whether a statutory-based press council should be appointed by the Government or by some other means to make it independent of government was "subject to discussion. I don't have a hang-up about how you do it."
He says he understands the arguments for reform of the libel laws. "I haven't changed my mind that there are outstanding issues to do with libel."
But he also wants to change the system whereby people who feel they have been wronged by the press often have to pay enormous legal bills just to disprove false allegations. It had personally cost him a lot of money to clear his name in relation to a false allegation by a Cork businessman that he had handed him a cheque in a Dublin hotel car-park.
He believes there will be an Assembly election in Northern Ireland in November. He will have his last strategy meeting with Tony Blair today in Rome on the margins of a meeting with EU leaders. However, there was nothing more that the two governments could do after that, and what was required was straightforward.
"We need a substantive statement" from the IRA in line with the principles outlined by Mr Blair and Mr Ahern a year ago. These principles demanded a statement that all IRA activity was at an end.
"We're not being prescriptive about the words, but the principles that we enunciated this time last year and tried our best to negotiate last March and April have to be reflected in a statement that will remove the logjam."
The Ulster Unionist Party, for its part, "will have to say that they will work the power-sharing executive to its full and that they will implement it to its full and stop this up-down, stop-start, go-reverse that we have had.
"We are coming to an end position. We have now maximum two weeks. The issue is whether we can get to calling an election. I very much want one. My belief is there will be one. I can't be sure about that but I do believe there will be one."
He will retire from politics when he is 60 - in eight years' time.
"I put in 16 or 17 hours a day every day and I do 90 hours a week so it's tough going and I've been doing it for a long time. I've made up my mind that whatever I'm at in politics at 60, I'm getting out. Wherever I am, whether that's a county councillor, a TD or whatever honour people give me when I'm 60, I'm going to get out then."
But what would this 14 hours a day, 90 hours a week politician do then? "I love sport. I could well involve myself voluntarily in sport. I just love gardening, I love horticulture. My huge interests are the botanical gardens and the zoological gardens.
"I've enormous interest in heritage buildings and heritage houses, walled gardens and things like that. I could spend my time merrily doing that. I don't think you'll see me being a guru in business in the Middle East or anything like that."
European Commissioner? "I've no interest in any of those jobs, none whatever. I have been sounded out on them but I've no interest and I've made it absolutely clear."