Former FG leader Michael Noonan talks to Mark Hennessy about tactics for the next election
Former Fine Gael leader Mr Michael Noonan has said the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern's decision to label himself as a socialist has helped to soften the Government's image with disaffected voters.
The Limerick East TD said the Taoiseach had deliberately used the description to create a media controversy to indicate that Fianna Fáil was moving position and had learned the lesson of the June elections.
Asked if he had been successful, Mr Noonan replied: "Oh, yeah. To signal a change of position like that in politics you have to exaggerate.
"Hyperbole is the tool of changing position.
"It was a classic exercise in political hyperbole. I would never doubt his skills. He is a very skilful politician and has been very successful.
"He has been 10 years leading FF and won two elections back-to-back. Not even Jack Lynch managed that."
However, Mr Noonan, who resigned as FG leader after the party's disastrous 2002 performance, ridiculed Mr Ahern's socialist tag: "I laughed out loud. I thought it was very funny.
"Is there any truth to it? No, not to be grasping isn't a definition of being a socialist. If words mean anything he is not a socialist," Mr Noonan told The Irish Times in a recent interview.
Mr Noonan urged the Labour Party to agree to a pre-election pact with Fine Gael, despite the doubts held by some in the Parliamentary Labour Party and elsewhere in the organisation about the wisdom of such a move.
"If Fianna Fáil is to be put out of power, Fine Gael and other Opposition parties are going to have to put a clear alternative before the public well in time for the election," he argued.
Labour had to tie its wagon to Fine Gael, regardless of the views of those within Labour who want the party leader, Mr Pat Rabbitte, to keep the party's electoral options open, he believed.
Dismissing the each-way bet option sought by some Labour doubters, he said: "I would say that that was exactly the thinking before the last election and it has us where we are today: in Opposition, putting it very bluntly.
"Wouldn't the Taoiseach and his friends be absolutely delighted if the Opposition parties went into the election as separate parties, with a nod to the electorate that we will get together if we are elected?
"Nobody is going to buy into that. Sure, if there is any lesson from the last election, that was the principal lesson," said Mr Noonan, who also favoured the involvement of the Green Party in a Rainbow alliance.
"The only concern that I have heard [about an alliance with the Greens] is from some farmers, thinking that if the Greens were in government they would be over-regulated.
"There is a strong environmentalist feeling within FG as well, especially among younger members.
"I actually think that the inclusion of the Greens would make the coalition option more attractive.
"I think that they make the Rainbow option more appealing. They are a plus, not a minus. I think no matter what the composition of the future Rainbow, it would be important that even if the detail of policy is not announced before the election, the main principles of policy are put up," Mr Noonan said.
"I don't think it will be enough to give people a choice of personalities.
"The choice of personalities will have to be reinforced by nailing your colours to the mast in terms of policy.
"How far out this is done from an election is a tactical thing. But it has to be done before the election so that the campaign is about not only an alternative set of people but also an alternative set of policies," he said.