Just under a decade ago, Catherine Connolly diagnosed the Labour Party had “lost its soul”. This afternoon, the Independent TD for Galway West - who was a Labour councillor and Dáil aspirant for the party before decamping in 2006 - will go searching for its votes to formally back her for the presidential election race.
A meeting is set between Connolly and the 13 Oireachtas members of the Parliamentary Labour Party for 4.30pm today. Connolly, having secured the backing of the Social Democrats, People Before Profit and several Independent members, has the wind at her back and seems almost certain to secure the 20 required votes regardless of whether Labour backs her. In some ways, it’s a more consequential decision for Labour than it is for Connolly.
It must decide if the messy break-up between the party and Connolly is still a salient factor. She left the party having failed to get on the ticket as a running mate for Michael D Higgins in the 2007 general election. As an Independent TD, she was a forthright critic of Labour in government.
However, some party grandees who served in cabinet and were on the receiving end of those criticisms are sanguine about her potential endorsement by the party. “On balance,” says one, speaking privately, “I think bygones be bygones”. This mirrors the views of some within the current parliamentary party, who like her politics and her pugnacious, sincere style, while harbouring some concerns. One TD says her history with Labour is “not relevant” to their consideration of her candidacy: “The past is just that”.
A second former senior figure in the Labour Party says they are undecided, while simultaneously saying they would have no principled objection to Connolly based on her history with Labour. But they outline their view that the forthright Galway native can be “quite difficult to work with”, adding knowingly that people who favour her within Labour may not have had much to do with her in the past. There are also those who want to know more about what her platform is - and what precisely is the nature of support that will be sought. Will it just be Oireachtas votes and rhetorical endorsements, or will manpower and money also be sought?
Openness should not be confused for a headlong enthusiasm for backing Connolly, from past or present members of the parliamentary party - and she will have her work cut out to win over some current TDs. Some are of the view that Tipperary North’s Alan Kelly will take particular convincing. But what she does have going for her is an alignment of political circumstances that leaves Labour open to endorsement, rather than fielding its own candidate.
The party views itself as having changed the nature of the presidency with Mary Robinson, and as having some political custody of the office given Higgins’s enduring popularity across his two terms. Sitting out the presidential campaign entirely would be unpalatable - but it also knows that Connolly’s emergence as a left wing front-runner will soak up Oireachtas votes that could go to an alternative candidate, even one given a significant bump by 13 Labour votes.
A second left candidate could also split the vote, while Connolly is seen as someone who may be well positioned to surf the political zeitgeist in the autumn. By this stage, muses one grandee, the evenings will be longer, the weather worse, and an unpopular Government will be closing in on a budget with none of the baubles that voters have become used to. In those circumstances, many may use the chance to back an anti-establishment candidate so the Government parties feel their displeasure in what is ultimately a second order election.
