Rabbitte must lead, not follow

There is more to Pat Rabbitte than the quick rejoinder and the witty aside. There is a sense of the purpose of politics; to create a fair society. There is more steel to him than there was to Ruairí Quinn and more idealism than there was to Dick Spring. But . . . but . . .

The first "but" about Mr Rabbitte arises from his pedigree and the Workers' Party of which he was a happy member for a long time. I should acknowledge that as far as I am concerned the Statute of Limitations cuts in for the Official IRA and its activities, which should have been an embarrassment for the Workers' Party.

No, my point is a different one. It is that someone who has been through so many political hoops - Sinn Féin, Sinn Féin The Workers' Party, The Workers' Party, New Agenda, Democratic Left and now Labour - may not know when to stop jumping. We see it spectacularly in others of that original species, who find a new political position almost weekly. There is a suspicion that their political core was never centred, that they never believed in anything, other than what appeared to be chic or opportunist at the time.

There is more to Pat Rabbitte than that, I think, but can we be certain he knows he has done the hoops for the last time?

There is another "but".

He talks a lot nowadays of the people "up and down the country" (a recurrent speech mannerism) wanting rid of Fianna Fáil or wanting something else. He talks of building the Labour organisation and "connecting with its base". I think there is something substantive to what he means by this but it is not clear to me. And even if he does mean something by this now, it probably will dissolve into another piece of political blather in a while.

But I am very suspicious of hunch politics. Michael McDowell is the other great exponent of this - always going on about what the people want as though he is a pollster or a clairvoyant.

The reason for my suspicion of hunch politics is that it is the opposite of what politics is supposed to be about - thinking through what is right and then persuading people to support your analysis.

So this "up and down the country" stuff is suspicious. It betrays an unwillingness to confront the real problem of socialism in Ireland: that the people don't think socialist, they think capitalist and that the task of socialism is not to gell with what they are currently thinking "up and down the country" but to get them to change their minds "up and down the country", even where their self interest is challenged.

A fairer Ireland would mean more taxation, the sole remaining mechanism for wealth redistribution, without which claims to fairness are a pretence. Without more taxation there cannot be better primary schools to help even out the inequalities arising from the circumstances of birth; there cannot be proper health care to even out the spectacular inequalities in mortality rates for most major diseases between the rich and the poor; there is no chance of evening out the disparities in basic living conditions between the rich and the poor. And they don't like more taxes "up and down the country".

But there is more. Confrontation with the forces of reaction must also be undertaken and this may lose votes.

Over crime - the injustice of imprisoning the poor for the infliction of harms that are minuscule compared with those perpetrated by the powerful, who escape the clutches of the criminal justice system. And over the reform of conditions in our prisons.

Over refugees - if there is to be a presumption of illegality for immigrants from certain countries, why is there not a presumption of legality for immigrants from other countries, including most African countries?

Over Travellers - and here is a real test. If there is not a will to fight the racism over Travellers, then forget everything else. Not that the only issue that matters is the Traveller issue but it is a touchstone.

And then there is the issue of money and politics. Pat Rabbitte has been defensive over a £5,000 donation he got from Citywest developers, claiming that money was needed to fund his European Parliament campaign. But if that was okay, isn't the practice that biases the political system in favour of the rich okay as well, and what is he doing complaining about Fianna Fáil making that even worse?

Complaining about Fianna Fáil is in danger of becoming a cliché. In a letter to Labour members during the leadership campaign he wrote: "What is required now in Dáil Éireann is a Labour Party that will tear into this right-wing Government and mean it." Tearing into the Government may be fine but tearing into injustice and prejudice is finer and is essentially what Labour should be about.

It should be what Pat Rabbitte is about.