Pat Leahy: FF and FG do not relish coalition with the other but it seems inevitable

Spreading coronavirus will put severe pressure on politicians to form a government

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar at a post-Cabinet coronavirus briefing. Some of his TDs wonder why he is issuing pungent denunciations of Sinn Féin on a Sunday, then urging that party to form a government on a Monday. Photograph: PA Wire

Many people in Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael seem content to wrestle (separately) with their consciences for the foreseeable future over a possible coalition government. But they are unlikely to be afforded that indulgence for much longer.

The coronavirus outbreak in Ireland is now likely to escalate quickly. After private briefings this week, Ministers and senior officials believe that we are headed for hundreds and probably thousands of cases within weeks; there will be closures of schools and business, cancellation of events and so on.

The only question is how long it will last and how bad it gets. But it will certainly get bad enough for there to be very severe pressure on politicians to get on with it and form a government. I think it is likely that in the coming weeks the political context will change drastically.

TDs returned to the Dáil this week for a largely pointless day of statements about the last European Council and the coronavirus. It was hard to find a single one who did not believe that the next government would be formed by Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Greens.

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The small parties of the radical left and Sinn Féin are gearing up to oppose and condemn the arrangement they all expect: the first demonstration and march takes place today (Saturday). You can be sure there will be others, though it is significant that Sinn Féin is not joining today’s rally.

And though they warn of a furious reaction if – as they would see it – Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael frustrate the public’s wish for change, Sinn Féin and the radical left parties have acknowledged that any government that commands a majority in the Dáil is democratically and politically legitimate. We do, after all, live in a parliamentary democracy.

If there was a way to form the desired coalition of the left, the changistas would have done it by now. The passage of the weeks has not changed the parliamentary numbers.

Participants

But if everyone on the outside believes that a FF-FG-plus-plus government is inevitable (if undesirable), the only sceptics I could find around Leinster House about its prospects were the supposed participants.

Prompted by his public wooing of Fine Gael on RTÉ that morning, Micheál Martin faced a mini-revolt at his parliamentary party meeting where several TDs spoke in opposition to his strategy. Others are quietly encouraging them, and there is much talk of walkouts at cumann level, of grannies spinning in their graves.

What was Martin at?

It looks to me like the Fianna Fáil leader knows he will face significant opposition in his party to a Fine Gael deal, and he wants to have the row now rather than when he is actually negotiating it or when he returns to his party for approval. Smart – but only if he wins. If he doesn’t, his party needs a new leader.

Fine Gael wants to go into opposition, but most of its TDs recognise that it doesn’t have a route there.

The chief opponent of the proposed coalition appears to be the Taoiseach, whose determination to find a way to opposition impresses some of his TDs, but alarms more of them. They wonder why he is issuing pungent denunciations of Sinn Féin on a Sunday, then urging that party to form a government on a Monday.

Donohoe has been seeking to rally the “political centre” in two recent speeches – and you don’t need to be a student of politics or of Paschal to figure out what that means. Some of his colleagues are pursuing back-channel contacts with Fianna Fáil, but nothing will move until Varadkar moves. When he returns from next week’s trip to the White House, he will find, I think, that the political situation requires him to do that, and do it quickly.

Enter stage left

At that point the Green Party is likely to enter stage left. Eamon Ryan will meet his party organisation in a series of meetings soon , when he will seek its endorsement to proceed with coalition talks in a far more serious and productive way.

I expect the Greens to be quite clear-eyed about all this: if Ryan gets what he wants in policy terms – a government that will lead a step change in climate policy – he will do everything he can to lead his party into that coalition. If he doesn’t, he won’t.

He will not stick on requiring the Department of Public Expenditure, but he will require a structure in government -–modelled on the old Economic Management Council at the heart of the 2011-2016 Labour-Fine Gael cabinet – that gives the Greens a central role in policy and public spending decisions.

The central mission of the government – if it can be put together – will be housing, health and climate action. Nothing else will matter remotely as much, and policy actions in other areas will be put on the back burner to facilitate action and expenditure on these three priorities.

There will be storm of protest at its construction, for sure. But the notion – common in both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael – that ceding the leadership of the opposition to Mary Lou McDonald is a prelude to a Sinn Féin overall majority in five years is pearl-clutching taken to absurd lengths. Who knows what politics will look like in five months, never mind five years? If the election was held a few months earlier Sinn Féin would have been lucky to win 20 seats.

Ballot box

If the next government doesn’t make palpable progress on housing and health it will be monstered at the ballot box next time no matter who leads it. Its only salvation will be its success.

If that is daunting for Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, it is nothing compared to what would await them in another election. Neither party relishes coalition with the other. But politics is often about choosing the least bad option.