The controversy over the Oireachtas golf dinner and the subsequent resignation of Dara Calleary was a spectacular end to the worst week the Government has endured since its formation, and the future of the administration is now seriously in question.
The ability of the Government to function effectively into the future now depends on how it manages the return to school, the resurgence in Covid-19 infections and the Leaving Cert results.
If it screws those things up in the next three weeks the administration may – its strong Dáil majority notwithstanding – simply fall apart. That’s what happens when a government cannot function in the performance of its day-to-day business. And if it can’t manage these forthcoming tasks successfully there’s not really much point to its continuation anyway.
There is much discussion around the party leaders about the need for a reset or a relaunch or a reboot – call it what you like – of the administration. But that can only work if it signals a discovery of common purpose that has been absent from the start.
Let’s remember that the Government was having an appalling week even before news of the golf dinner was broken by the Irish Examiner on Thursday night.
The scheduling mix-up at Tuesday’s Cabinet and the bad-tempered fallout from it was not just one of those things that happens in government – it is the latest in a series of one-of-those-things that happen to this astoundingly accident-prone Government.
In truth, it is the latest in a series of spats – most behind the scenes but some visible to everyone – that have dogged the Coalition since its formation. True, they all agreed that the golf dinner was an outrage (they were right), but agreement on this proposition does not cover up the cracks between the parties visible in the first half of the week.
This is not a Government that has been operating efficiently, effectively or coherently, and things got significantly worse this week. They got worse internally because of the row at Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting, and they got worse externally because of the escapades on the 19th hole in Clifden.
“The mood about the place,” says one insider, “is absolutely cussed.”
Strong leadership
Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil – along with the Greens – specifically told voters that they were entering into government because the country needed strong leadership from political moderates at a period of acute crisis.
Yet the two big parties have not established the relationship of trust that enables a common purpose, a set of shared objectives, a sense that they are in it together. In several conversations this week, even before the latest calamity, senior figures in both parties admitted as much. And without that the Coalition cannot function.
They are by turns suspicious and privately contemptuous of each other.
The Fianna Fáil lads think that the Fine Gael lads are only half-committed at best (they nurture especial doubts about the Tánaiste) and the Fine Gaelers watch aghast at one Fianna Fáil disaster after another. Fianna Fail wonders if the other side wants it to work; Fine Gael wonders if the other side can make it work.
The Green leader Eamon Ryan understands that he may have to try to bring the misfiring coalition partners together. But he also knows he cannot spend all his time as a relationship counsellor. He has enough on his plate.
In any event, Ryan cannot make them get on with one another; they either want to make it work or they don’t. So far it has looked like they don’t.
One veteran of coalition governments explained this week what he thought the simple secret to a successful joint administration is: you have to believe the other lads are not a bunch of bowsies.
Actually, I am not sure if this is the case. You can believe your coalition partners are a bunch of desperate bowsies as long as you believe they are on your side. That they are trying to achieve the same results as you. That you share a common project. That is manifestly not the case at present. Says one person who works at the heart of government: “It can’t go on like this.”
The enemy
If this Government is to work Fine Gael needs to realise Fianna Fáil isn’t (for now anyway) the enemy. Fianna Fail needs to realise that Fine Gael has a lot more recent experience at this kind of thing, and how to learn from it.
Leo Varadkar might have been a bit petulant about a Cabinet sub-committee meeting being cancelled, but he was probably right that it would have been better to thrash out the new restrictions first before bringing them to Cabinet.
If this seems over-obsessed with the mechanics of government process, apologies to readers; but this is the sort of thing that matters for the smooth functioning of a coalition government. Making sure everyone is included. Keeping lines of communication opening. Constantly re-emphasising the commonality of purpose. That is harder during a crisis – much harder. It is also more important.
The two parties might this weekend consider the alternative. If Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael go back to the electorate because they couldn’t get on with one another they will deserve the thrashing they will get before they watch Sinn Féin lead the next government.
“Who will get the blame if it falls apart?” one former minister wondered last week. My answer: if it falls apart there will be enough blame to go around for everyone.
Says one senior civil servant: “If they want the country to pull together, they need to start doing it themselves.”
Hard to argue with that.