The Greening of Hypocrisy

Every promise broken, ‘core' beliefs abandoned in a naive conviction that the Greens in government can make a difference. And then a striking act of integrity: the resignation of Trevor Sargent as leader and his rejection of a senior cabinet position.  By Vincent Browne

No coalition with Fianna Fáil, no US troops at Shannon, no co-location of private hospitals on public hospital lands, no truck with Bertie without explanation on his finances, no anti-social behaviour orders, no increase in capital gains tax. All in return for the privilege of implementing the Fianna Fáil manifesto promises on the environment.

But aside from that there was an almost touching naiveté. The Greens believe they can make a difference at the cabinet table. They acknowledge privately the Programme for Government doesn't amount to much but the difference will be in their input into cabinet decisions.

The joy of their conference on the night of  Wednesday 13 June in the Round Room of the Mansion House was moving. For the first time ever in Irish politics, it was the members of the Green Party that decided the direction of the party and endorsed the recommendation to go into government with Fianna Fáil. For many of them it was a troubled decision, troubled because of those broken promises, perhaps particularly on Shannon and the M3 motorway through Tara.

Only a few weeks ago Trevor Sargent dismissed the idea of coalition with Fianna Fáil with the colloquism “get real”. The Greens were the only party, aside from the Socialist Party, to challenge Bertie Ahern on his finances during the election campaign. They were vociferous in opposition to inequality in health especially as represented by the hospitals co-location issue. And on the anti-war front…

The Anti-War movement of which the Greens were a prominent part has issued a press release documenting the commitments made by the Greens on the use of Shannon as a facilitation for the war in Iraq. It points out that section 13 of the Green Party election manifesto declares that the Green Party is committed to ending the “use of Shannon airport by US military forces involved in the war in Iraq and insist that any aircraft suspected of involvement in illegal movements of prisoners must be searched”.

In a Dáil debate on 5 April last Trevor Sergeant said: “Most disgracefully we continue to facilitate more than 1million US troops that have passed through Shannon Airport on the way to what started as an illegal and immoral war. It remains immoral, whatever about the retrospective sanction from the United Nations. It was a war of invasion which we should not have supported.”

But then in the wake of that troubled conference a decision came, an act of validation that was almost stunning. Trevor Sargents' announcement that he had to abide by his promise not to lead the Greens into government with Fianna Fáil, followed by his second declaration that he would not accept one of the to cabinet positions on offer to the Greens. In spite of the broken promises and the compromises, there remains a robust integrity within the Green Party.

The election was a mandate for no change. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael won almost 70 per cent of the first preference vote and, obviously, while Fine Gael wanted a change of faces, they offered no change of policy. That was true of the PDs and Labour as well, so the aggregate mandate for no change was around 83 per cent.

For Fianna Fáil it was another endorsement of its pre-eminent position in Irish politics. Although the party has never achieved the mandate won by Charles Haughey and Jack Lynch (Fianna Fáil's worst performance under Charles Haughey was 44.2 per cent and this was in the face of the surge of support for the PDs, while Jack Lynch's worst performance was 45.7 per cent), it has persisted as the party-of-government. By 2012, Fianna Fáil will have been in government for twenty two and a half of the previous twenty five years and there is little reason to doubt but that the party will then win another five year mandate.

All the revelations and allegations of corruption surrounding the party have had no impact on its durability. Neither have the disclosures of spectacular incompetence and wastage of public funds – for instance the astounding €12 billion over-spend on the roads programme has rated hardly a mention.

The party's success has rested partly on good fortune – being in government at a time when the economy was itself emerging from the trough of the 1980s. Partly on the strength of its organisation nationwide. Partly on its continuing capacity to attract middle class educated representatives of relatively high caliber, unencumbered by “ideological hang-ups” (by which is meant representatives rooted in the prevailing political mind-set, undisturbed by contradictions and inequities). Partly, indeed largely, by the educative experience of office.

Fianna Fáil's prospects “going forward” (to deploy a buzz phrase used without embarrassment by many of its leading lights) are impressive. Its organisation remains the most formidable in Irish politics. It has a cadre of high level representatives more impressive than anything the main opposition party is offering – the likes of Brian Cowen, Micheál Martin, Dermot Ahern, Brian Lenihan, Mary Hanafin and Noel Dempsey.

And, crucially, it has got access to loads of finance and the backing of the largest media corporation in the State, Independent Newspapers. And it has a leader in waiting whose intellect and competence is unmatched, Brian Cowen. Having defused the “national” issue, established its credentials in economic management, survived a fleeting apprehension over sleaze, Fianna Fáil is virtually unassailable. And, perhaps most importantly, it encapsulates the mind-set of modern Ireland.