Nothing can be in the national interest unless it’s in Fianna Fáil’s interest – and so it will oppose everything
MONDAY WAS an odd day. In the morning I sat at the window, not reading miserable newspaper columns, watching the birds and resolving to write cute domestic columns to cheer people up. That night I sat in a studio full of Fianna Fáilers for RTÉ's Frontlineand thinking: "Dear God – they are never going to go away."
The programme was about the future of Fianna Fáil. The premise was that with a Red C poll rating of just 13 per cent, that future was bleak.
Don’t fret! People give the populist answer to pollsters instead of the truth. The polling companies have to “adjust” the results to account for “understating”.
For instance, the Fine Gael numbers are holding steady around 32 per cent. Isn’t it amazing that even though no journalist will say a good word about its leader, the party has one-third of the votes?
And isn’t it amazing that even though the party has one-third of the votes, no journalist will say a good word about its leader? Hello media bias. I would say that 32 per cent is “understated” too.
Anyway, the “adjustments” can never quite keep pace with the lies. Those swearing never to vote Fianna Fáil again will make an exception for their local TD who is a grand fella. Or they’ll register their protest this time with Sinn Féin or the United Left Alliance (or the People’s Front of Judea as broadsheet.ie labelled the motley crew). But they’ll be back.
They always come back – no matter how many times Fianna Fáil completely wrecks the country. And they do it once a generation.
After the election Fianna Fáil will have ample numbers to lead a robust opposition and promptly proceed to recklessly and ruthlessly oppose everything the government does even if it’s in the national interest. That’s because nothing can be in the national interest unless it’s in Fianna Fáil’s interest.
If a government had a cure for cancer or could introduce world peace, Fianna Fáil would oppose it.
It arises from a belief that there are two entities: the nation and the State. Fianna Fáil has no loyalty to the State because that was founded by its enemies, the winners of the Civil War, Cumann na Gael. It believes in a separate ethereal body – the nation – which only Fianna Fáil truly represents.
This psychology allows the party to say quite honestly it will, as Micheál Martin said on Monday night, “act in the national interest while in opposition”.
He could also make a meaningless commitment to supporting the four-year plan because he knows it was out of date five minutes after it was published.
Supporting the government will never be in the national interest because that wouldn’t be in Fianna Fáil’s interest. It is this reasoning that allowed the party to oppose the Anglo-Irish Agreement. No progress in the North was permitted by Fianna Fáil unless it was behind it.
It was also aided by the refusal of Sinn Féin and the IRA to deal with any other party other than Fianna Fáil. Acceptance by the people of this reality was a factor in the 1997 election.
The economy was sorted but a peace deal could only be achieved by Fianna Fáil.
Reading Eoghan Harris’s column on Sunday I realised: public sector reform is going to be the new peace process.
Harris identified that the banking issue is out of our hands and the big issue for the next government is public sector reform.
Fine Gael knows it must be done but the party will be hampered by Labour. With its close ties to the unions and donations from Siptu, Labour has its hands tied behind its back when dealing with the trade unions.
Labour should break these ties, because it has never benefited from the association.
The public sector knows that despite recent years, in the long term, their sugar daddy is Fianna Fáil not Labour.
So here’s how it could play out. The Croke Park Agreement froze public sector pay in exchange for reform, but those reforms would be reviewed in May 2011 – when Fianna Fáil knew it would be out of power.
That leaves the next government the appalling task of either negotiating those reforms or cutting pay further (or probably both by the time Chopra is through with us).
The unions will dig in and refuse to deal with Fine Gael, just as Sinn Féin and the IRA did in the peace process. Labour will wring its hands. Fianna Fáil will have a ball in Opposition exploiting the resulting industrial relations mess.
I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if people realised at the following election that the only way to get a deal is to put Fianna Fáil back in.
There is an alternative future. If that 32 per cent for Fine Gael is understated, it could eat into a Labour bounce from the right.
Meanwhile the People’s Front of Judea and Sinn Féin could hack in from the left.
This could leave Fine Gael considerably larger than Labour in the next government. When the trench warfare over privilege days and redeployment starts, it’s conceivable that the support of Fianna Fáil in opposition for public sector reform might be needed.
Is there a future where Fianna Fáil does the right thing and supports desperately needed reforms but from the other side of the House?
It’s against everything in its DNA but I suppose one can look out the window, watch the birds and dream.