Fine Gael and Labour pay tribute to Haughey

A public relations stunt reveals the policy vacuity of the alternative government.

While Fianna Fáil in Cavan would have wished the memory of Charles Haughey will be long expunged before the general election in the next 20 months, Fine Gael and Labour in Mullingar were paying warm if unintentional tribute to the former Taoiseach.

It was a clever promotional stunt on Monday 5 September for Fine Gael and Labour to publish their joint statement on A New Departure for Social Partnership. This was not to announce any new initiative, but to upstage Fianna Fáil who were holding their late summer talk-in in Cavan. In fact the document said nothing and promised nothing but in recording the successes of partnership agreements paid homage to the person who instituted such agreements, Charles Haughey. It was he as Taoiseach who started the social partnership agreements in 1987, which the Fine Gael/Labour document now acknowledges was a key component in the economic success that ensued.

Fine Gael was hostile to such partnerships, especially while John Bruton was leader, although as Taoiseach of the Rainbow Coalition his government went along with them. Now all such reserve is gone, Fine Gael is an enthusiast for partnership agreements.

The document, almost certainly written by Richard Bruton, perhaps with some (very) modest input from Labour, is an impressive analysis of the difficulties facing a new agreement. No longer can tax reductions be traded for moderation on pay for there is little or no room for tax deductions at a time when the demand is for more investment in infrastructure, childcare, housing and health. It could be said to be tapping into "Eddie Hobbs's Ireland", addressing the issues which the electorate feels exercised about at present.

It also deals with the need for public service reform, more democratic accountability in relation to partnership agreements themselves, and deals with the constraints on public service pay increases. It goes on to refer to poverty and disadvantage. It notes: "Relative income poverty has grown, there has been little attempt to reform social welfare, educational disadvantage has not been prioritised as an issue and the RAPID programme (the programme for the regeneration of disadvantaged areas) was cynically abandoned".

And there is a nod towards Green concerns on sustainability and greenhouse gases.

But there is not a single policy statement in the document. Not even one commitment to do anything about the issues it raises. That is aside from the five bland conclusions, the last of which reads: "The consumer must be given a stronger voice in the Partnership process and there is particular responsibility on Government to represent users of public services and families under pressure".

Richard Bruton and Liz McManus, the respective deputy leaders of the two parties, are now deputed to draw up proposals on dealing with wastage of public funds, which is indicative of the soft focus strategy of the two parties: deal in broad generalised terms with the issues; avoid specifics; especially specifics that might annoy an important constituency.

It is clear that in the next election the electorate will be asked simply to choose between opposing coalitions that agree almost entirely on policy, even when one of the coalitions includes the right wing Progressive Democrats and the other includes the supposedly socialist Labour Party.

The disclosures by the United Nations Development Programme, the ERSI and Combat Poverty of increased inequality in Ireland in the midst of growing prosperity does not embolden even the Left here into proposing anything specific to redress that. It leaves the way open to Sinn Féin and radical Independents to mop up the mass of disillusioned and disaffected, which may result in a hung Dáil and a very odd mix of parties and arrangements underpinning the next government.