As the political circus toured the suburbs and provinces, its blurred internecine nonsense put it at a far remove, writes ANN MARIE HOURIHANE.
DESPITE THE media excitement about the local and European elections – elections are fun to cover, and of course fascinating if you are working for a candidate – there are those of us who are finding it increasingly difficult to care.
For the most part, commentaries from counts round the country sounded less like an exercise in representative democracy and more like a round of that old card game, Happy Families. By the time the reporter had finished detailing the dynastic connections of the candidates, the electorate was head down in its soup, snoring.
The plain people of Ireland have long been wondering what difference, really, distinguishes Fianna Fáil from Fine Gael. The only thing they’re good at is hating each other. But now we’re wondering what difference there is, really, between Labour and the Greens. Never has a ballot sheet presented a less edifying prospect. No wonder some young voters in Dublin South decided to embellish their votes with smiley faces.
We are the voters, the people who actually turn up at the polling station. We’re the ones who have always argued that it’s your duty to vote.
We’re the ones who set off early for work in order to vote, or drop the kids with a neighbour so that we can vote, or who call in on our way home to vote.
We’re the ones who have always held ourselves a little bit above the people who couldn’t be bothered to vote – but this election has been so depressing for the voters that we are now beginning to understand how the non-voters feel.
The only thing that brought us to the polling station was the opportunity to give the Government a good kicking.
Now we have to ask ourselves whether giving the Government a good kicking is enough.
And, you know, it’s not.
Our torpor has not been enlivened either by the spokespersons for the parties.
Dermot Ahern, who always seems to draw the short straw when it comes to explaining Fianna Fáil to the rest of us, tried to put the rout of the Government down to the fact that it had been forced to take “these tough decisions”.
Yesterday, on the RTÉ news at lunchtime, Ahern referred to this country as “Ireland Inc” – surely a tactical error, in our present economic circumstances – and said that, in the future, “the Irish people will judge us as one of the agents of recovery for this country”.
He didn’t even sound as if he believed that himself.
Meanwhile, on Saturday night, Enda Kenny was telling us that he was going to put down a motion of no confidence in the Government this week. He seemed genuinely excited by the idea.
A weary electorate can only hope that it keeps fine for Enda. Let us know when it’s over.
The electorate had some important decisions to make. Is it more worrying to think that the politicians are lying to us – and expect us to believe them – or that they are lying to themselves, and are convinced of what they say?
Would it be helpful to close down the Dáil and the local councils for 12 months and send them all on a transition year? Perhaps that would refresh our political system. It would give our representatives a glimpse of how other people live, and so provide them with the opportunity to pursue alternative careers.
Or would we be better off just to close the Dáil completely, and save some badly needed public money?
Driving through the countryside last week, in the summer sunshine, it was obvious how much hard work was being expended by the canvassers of all parties.
They trooped up driveways and stood under garden parasols as their foreheads burned in the heat. They shot from one town to another, shaking innumerable hands.
They incurred sprained knees and worn shoes and some of them lost a significant amount of weight in the course of the election campaign.
Quite a few of them were the much-celebrated young candidates, pitching for a seat for the first time, and looking pretty on their posters. But their youth and newness were the most interesting things about them.
The focus was on the local rivalries, boundaries and gossip which are endlessly fascinating to us all. There did not seem to be much talk of ideas, of new departures or even of the future.
In this atmosphere, it is easy to understand why the voters of Dublin South were glad to see George Lee. He sounds so certain. He belongs to a new political dynasty – the celebrity candidates – and it remains to be seen whether he can pass his Dáil seat on to the next economics editor of RTÉ when he is eventually finished with it. Good luck to him.
Somewhere along the line, politics left the ordinary voter. It’s hard to know exactly when that was. Perhaps it was at the planning tribunals. Perhaps it was well before that. Perhaps it was our fault. But the Dáil and the European Parliament and even our local councils are now part of a sealed world which has no bearing on the lives of the rest of us. The voices of all the parties have grown more and more distant, and that is why we can still surprise them with a kicking from time to time. Revenge is not particularly satisfying, but it has become the voter’s only pleasure.