THE votes are cast, we await the outcome. This moment of suspense is, perhaps, a good time at which to look back to the campaign, and forward to the tasks facing whatever government may be formed from the Dail that our as yet uncounted votes have created.
It seems to me the campaign was unsatisfactory because it largely failed to look forward to the problems and challenges that economic growth brings in its train. These fall into two categories, the first being the strains and tensions in society which are inevitably created by an uneven and visibly inequitable distribution of the product of economic growth already achieved.
And the second is the need to reform structures and devise policies so as to ensure that the future continuance of economic growth is not blocked by bottlenecks, by environmental constraints inadequately prepared for, or by failures of economic fine tuning leading to the emergence of overheating of the economy and inflationary pressures.
Associated with this latter problem in present circumstances is the possibility of having to steer our economy through troubled waters if EMU were to be postponed as a result of Franco German problems.
THE first issue, the need to secure an equitable distribution of the fruits of growth, was highlighted in the final leaders' debate by the Taoiseach, John Bruton. And, of course, the need for measures to tackle long term unemployment was recognised and addressed by the principal parties in their policy statements.
But in none of these policies was the broader issue of poverty in the midst of plenty addressed with serious proposals for targeting resources on disadvantaged areas and on the more deprived members of the community.
I believe this omission, not just in this campaign but also substantially in the practice of governments during the past decade of rapid economic growth, was bound to produce a degree of alienation that would express itself, not just in abstention from voting, but eventually also in support for fringe parties and Independents.
And, while perhaps two thirds of these microparty and Independent votes are bound to be wasted, a minority of them are liable to turn into seats that could make difficult the formation of the kind of stable government needed in order to tackle the problems of growth.
It is puzzling that most of the parties have failed to adjust their policies towards this issue, for they had ample warning that many voters were being alienated by this neglect and were drifting away from them.
Thus, by 1992 the proportion of the electorate who voted for Independents and for microparties not involved in the competition for government had jumped from 6 per cent or 7 per cent, the figure that had prevailed since the mid1970s, to almost 10 per cent. And in Dublin this trend had started even earlier, with this disaffected share of the vote rising from 8 per cent in 1987 and 10 per cent in 1989 to over 13 per cent in the 1992 election.
And since that 1992 election increasing awareness of the "Celtic Tiger" phenomenon has sharpened considerably the contrast between the growing prosperity of the majority who have good jobs, and the continuing deprivation of the minority of poor, many of whom are geographically concentrated in areas of severe disadvantage.
In the absence of a visible dramatic commitment to giving a real priority to these deprived areas, this increasingly flagrant contrast was bound to accelerate the drift away from the established parties of government.
It is true that in this election the Rainbow parties directed their tax plans towards the lower paid and those on middle incomes, in contrast to the PDs, who targeted the better off and Fianna Fail who put their electoral faith in the maxim that tax rate reductions are easier to "sell" to the electorate, regardless of their regressive and antisocial effects when implemented without simultaneous increases in personal allowances.
But the really poor do not pay tax, and thus have no interest whatever in the tax system. They have three principal needs.
First, they need incomes sufficient to lift them above the deprivation level, and this is particularly true of those of them with children who, if brought up in grinding poverty, will find it much harder to resist the lure of drugs and crime.
Second, most of those whose poverty is due to long term unemployment need extensive reeducation and training in order to make them readily employable. They need to be enabled by such measures to compete for jobs on a more equal footing with those leaving the educational system (some half of whom now have third level qualifications); with emigrants returning to Ireland bringing with them valuable experience; and with women who have earlier employment experience and who come back into the labour force after a period caring for children at home.
And, third, the majority of the poor who live in deprived communities need a major investment that will rehabilitate these areas, as well as concentrating upon them virtually all additional social and educational resources for a period of years.
TWO factors have inhibited this latter process. On the one hand there is the strong Civil Service tradition of spreading resources evenly and resisting geographical targeting as being open to political abuse.
And, on the other hand, there is the reluctance of politicians in Cabinet to concede targeting of resources to certain areas at the expense of other areas which they themselves individually represent.
Despite these constraints, a start has been made in some of these policy areas. But up to now these interventions have been too thinly spread and too faltering to make any significant impact.
Politically, the Labour Party seems to have been the main loser as a result of this. In Government during the past five years it has, of course, been torn between its traditional role of support for the less well off in our society and an understandable concern to hang on to as much as possible of the middle class support that it won on such a remarkable scale in 1992. Between these two stools it seems to have slipped seriously in this election.
One may hope that after this election whichever combination of parties forms a government will radically review the present inadequate social targeting policies.
As for the problems involved in ensuring that our economic growth is maintained, John Bruton at the outset of the electoral campaign addressed this matter in an important speech. This failed to evoke any response from Fianna Fail or the Progressive Democrats, and this issue, which together with these problems of social division and the need to secure peace in Northern Ireland is one of the three key challenges facing the next government, then seemed to fade from the campaign.
And on sustainable growth even the Greens failed to get across their concern that future growth must be achieved without damage to the environment.
Too many of the speeches and releases from all the parties were in fact dedicated to the past rather than the future, to such issues as the instability of past governments led by now retired Fianna Fail leaders, or to Labour's departures from government in 1987 and 1994. And too little was said about the future.
It will be fascinating to see today what the electorate has made of it all.