AN IRISHWOMAN'S DIARY

TIME was and it wasn't such a very long time ago - that a Taoiseach would travel by public transport with the press during an election campaign. Talk at length on and off the record, not a handler in sight. Field any question, and if he didn't like the tone . . . well, tell the reporter concerned to take the shortest route to Hades. And definitely not apologise.

In one case, it was a British journalist, fresh into Dublin and reporting on the June, 1989 vote. "So what will you do after the election?" he asked C. J. Haughey, as we sat with our leader on the DART. Continue for another five years and then retire? Fearless, this young man was. War correspondent material. If there had been a window, he could have found himself halfway through it.

A few minutes later, the then Taoiseach laid his eyes on a sallow skinned young reporter. He asked her if she was Spanish. No, she was from the BBC.

There was a shrug, a wearisome sigh in response. "I suppose there has to be a BBC..." Protected by handlers You'd miss all that now in this age of processed, packaged, Cellophane wrapped, manicured politicians, protected by handlers who prefer to travel apart. So while John Bruton, as Opposition leader, was happy to take a provincial bus around the country in the depths of winter in 1992 - reading a biography of the Turkish leader, Kemal Ataturk, en route - the election coach last week was empty apart from a handful of journalists. Even on the train the week before, Mr Bruton could keep his distance if he chose to in a separate carriage. The scraps would be fed out if and when handlers deemed fit.

Issues? What issues could there be when a politician was travelling at 80 to 90 miles an hour through the midlands. Commitment to green government? One could test that by the length of the larger parties' high octane entourage. One of the biggest giggles was the Fine Gael concept of a "bypass Ireland", with an economy which was in danger of leaving the poor and marginalised behind. The party leader only had to voice concern for 30 seconds to camera. There were no leisurely stops to listen to the electorate last Monday in the midlands, no lay bys on this particular soundbite route.

If the camera led schedule left print journalists lagging at times, perhaps we had only ourselves to blame. Genuine grievances did not get sufficiently aired. Parties such as Fianna Fail had drawn up their "wish lists" beforehand. Were it not for independent candidates in some constituencies, the voice of minorities would not have been heard.

Election fodder As it was, the vulnerable became election fodder. Not a week after a baby had been found dead in a Co Laois graveyard and a 16 year old mother had come forward to gardai, the Progressive Democrats were sensitively stirring it up for single mothers. Bouquets to the leader, Mary Harney, for spotting an opportunity. The same prejudices had been recorded by several election directors on doorsteps in some of the more prosperous rural counties.

One woman who spoke, to this reporter during a constituency tour said she wanted to send Ms Harney a copy of Arthur Miller's The Crucible, the play (now also a film) about the witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts. It wasn't just the failure to mention single fathers that had upset her, or the fact that payments to lone parents took up only about 5 per cent of the social welfare budget. The working classes were far more tolerant and supportive of such situations, she felt, while the middle classes had a palpable fear of independent women.

Then there were the refugees and migrants - with travellers being mentioned in the subtext, where Romanians were concerned. It provided great sport for some Dublin candidates, such as the Fianna Fail councillor Colm McGrath, who issued a press release demanding an urgent review of the housing allocation to "illegal immigrants" in his constituency of Dublin South West.

"Local people in Tallaght and Clondalkin are incensed at the behaviour of these alleged political refugees, many of whom they suspect of being economic refugees here to milk our social welfare system," Councillor McGrath proclaimed. In one house, there had been the ritual slaughter of a lamb. In another, house in Tallaght, up to 30 refugees were sleeping rough, he said, and engaging in various' forms of antisocial behaviour".

Facts and myth Had he chosen to phone the Irish Refugee Council, the councillor's mind could have been put to rest. Again, vote catching relied less on fact and more on myth. Non EU nationals are generally not entitled to claim welfare here, according to the council. People seeking asylum are not allowed to work, or to sign on, while awaiting a decision on their future status. During this period, they can claim basic supplementary welfare payments, emergency accommodation and rent allowance, but they are not eligible for permanent local authority housing.

As both the council and Amnesty International's Irish section have pointed out, the issue of illegal immigration is completely separate to that of asylum seekers, who may be fleeing torture, unjust imprisonment or death. The 1996 Refugee Act is a major step forward in providing such protection, but it is still waiting to be fully implemented.

Mary Lawlor, Amnesty's director, has had asylum seekers in tears over the cead mile failte here. One Shia Muslim of Kurdish descent put his thoughts on paper. He is a physicist, with several languages, who has lost most of his family.

"I didn't come here to take money, he wrote. "I didn't come here to eat and sleep . . . I don't need to be called a scrounger. I like the Irish very much."