ANALYSIS: Ahern's departure will defuse tensions as the Greens hold their first conference since going into government, writes Mark Hennessy.
JUST 10 months ago, John Gormley spoke about the lack of attractions that "Planet Bertie" had for the Greens, before joining Fianna Fáil in power shortly afterwards. Today, Bertie Ahern's orbit is ending, and Gormley has reasons to be thankful that the Taoiseach announced his decision to stand down before the Greens gather in Dundalk for their annual conference this weekend.
Had Ahern not announced his departure, Gormley and his party would have faced an awkward time - one that the party hierarchy was dreading.
For months, the Greens had stuck to a clear line: defend the tribunal, and stay as far away from Ahern's finances as possible, with just a few exceptions.
And it worked, to a considerable extent. Some in the rank and file bridled, but they stayed in line, while the opinion polls carried good news, or no news. However, the line frayed after Gráinne Carruth's evidence, as it perhaps was always going to, and the Progressive Democrat call for explanations.
Ahern ended the agony before the Greens were really exposed to the flame, but there is reason to doubt if party discipline would have stayed coherent for much longer.
Gormley's decision to stand alongside Ahern as he made his resignation speech surprised many inside and outside of the party. Acknowledging that he probably got caught up in the emotion of the moment, it was still the smart action for one who will have to work with Fianna Fáil afterwards. In short, it was grown-up politics: pragmatic and necessary and, hopefully, remembered by those who agreed with it, and forgotten by everyone else.
One of the Greens' biggest headaches was not so much the inconsistencies in Ahern's evidence, but, rather, the efforts by Fianna Fáil Ministers to undermine Mahon. Every time they did, and they did so frequently, the Greens had to come out in its support - twice rebuffing Fianna Fáil attempts to offer less than wholehearted backing for the tribunal in Dáil motions.
So far, there is little evidence that the Greens' brand of "clean politics" has been tarnished by associating with Ahern, though there must be a chance that it has. The Greens will not have much chance to find out until next year's local and European elections, when they will be pushing hard to make gains.
Up to now, the Greens have been utterly dependent on transfers, so its decision to hunt with Fianna Fáil, rather than ride with Fine Gael and Labour, may harm their catch-all attractiveness.
Certainly, the decision to go into government contradicted transfer patterns thrown up in the last election: just 10 per cent of Green voters transferred to Fianna Fáil candidates. Over one-third migrated to Fine Gael candidates when a Green candidate was no longer in the race, while 27 per cent of them gave lower preferences to Labour.
The unanswerable question for now is whether those voters are ones who will stay with the Greens if they cannot be sure that a vote for the Greens is helping to remove FF.
The last 10 months have proven to be a sharp learning curve for the Greens. A party of protest has moved into the corridors of power. Both Gormley and fellow Green Cabinet colleague Eamon Ryan have taken to ministerial office like ducks to water, and they can claim a not insignificant list of policy successes. Building regulations have been strengthened; car taxes have been reformed to encourage smaller engine sizes; and the ESB has joined the green energy revolution. Oil exploration licences have been tightened, but only by a bit, while companies can write off spending on energy-efficient equipment.
"Last year, people might have had doubts about our ability to work in government. But we are doing it. We have shown that we can," Ryan said yesterday.
So far, the party organisation appears well pleased with the successes achieved; though some have had to learn that Ministers cannot deliver everything, or do so today. But there appears little division among them about the Mansion House decision, overwhelmingly passed, to go into government with Fianna Fáil.
Even former MEP Patricia McKenna, who opposed Coalition, now accepts that the Greens should stay in Government and implement its agenda in the programme for government.
There are few grounds for believing that the Greens' situation would be any better if it had gone into alliance with Fine Gael and Labour, and particularly the former: especially on the M3 and Tara and same-sex unions.
The rank and file's attitude to coalition will be on show during a debate tomorrow on a motion put down by the party's organisation in Dublin Mid-West, which seeks to censure the leadership, "given the very slow progress to date on dealing with issues of importance, particularly in relation to the environment".
However, party elders have already taken steps to head the criticism off at the pass, with a counter-motion that applauds the gains made, and foretells future ones. So far, three times the number of speakers want to speak in favour of the counter-motion - including Dublin Mid-West TD Paul Gogarty - than want to support the call for censure.
Surprisingly for a party in government, there will be no formal debate on the Lisbon Treaty, the biggest single challenge on the Government's agenda for the next two months. Its exclusion is hardly accidental for a party that is divided on the subject, and usually democratic enough to let those objections emerge unhindered into the public, and now experienced enough to know that parties cannot really do this often and function properly in government.
For now, the dominant issue for the Greens is what will life be like after Ahern departs on May 7th, and how will it do business with his successor, Brian Cowen.
The tax write-off for energy-efficient equipment, though not necessarily a big decision in itself, is evidence of the ability of Fianna Fáil's leader-designate and the Greens to work together. Not part of the programme for government, it emerged after Ryan went to Cowen to encourage him to put it into the Finance Bill, and offers, perhaps, evidence that the two sides can work pragmatically together.
It was not always thus. Just months ago, Green figures quietly worried about the onset of Cowen, particularly because they feared that he had not absorbed the environmental agenda. However, his speech to the Royal Irish Academy some months ago, in which he placed considerable emphasis on the need for sustainable environmental and economic policies, soothed nerves.
In truth, the political agenda - much of it very unpalatable to a consumerist audience - is moving in the Greens' direction. Policy victories have been achieved. Now they have to ensure that they get the credit for them.
Mark Hennessy is Political Correspondent ofThe Irish Times .