LAST Sunday, Bertie Ahern set out to clobber three birds with one speech. Celebrating the 80th anniversary of the Easter Rising at Arbour Hill, he wrapped the cloak of Padraig Pearse around Fianna Fail land gave both John Bruton and Dick Spring a puck in the eye over the peace process.

As a speech, it was light-years away from his studied response to the Canary Wharf bombing last February. On that occasion, he unequivocally placed prime responsibility for the breakdown of the ceasefire on the IRA leadership who, Mr Ahern said, had broken their word and treated Sinn Fein leaders with contempt.

By last week, the fault was being spread around, with a large dollop of blame being laid at Mr Bruton's door. The Taoiseach and the Government "were not up to the task of preserving the peace", Mr Ahern declared, with perfect political hindsight.

And it should not be forgotten, he said, that Dick Spring was the man who swapped Albert Reynolds for a warm admirer of John Redmond" at a critical moment in the peace process. Mr Ahern went on list the inadequacies, mistakes and cowardice of the Government for three long pages.

As a piece of crude political revisionism it was a gem. But Fianna Fail sources maintain it was motivated by a concern for the peace process and by a need to persuade the Government to mend its fences with republicans.

The republican movement's lack of confidence in this Government, and particularly in Mr Bruton, has been identified by Fianna Fail as a serious problem in the peace process. Poor relationships are seen by party sources as a major impediment to a restoration of the IRA ceasefire. But identifying a problem, and exploiting it for political purposes, are separate things.

Playing on Mr Bruton's moderate nationalist tendencies is not a new element in Fianna Fail's political strategy. Years ago, Albert Reynolds called him "John Unionist". And, last February in the Dail, Ned O'Keeffe wondered if he was related to a Sgt Bruton who had given evidence against one of the 1916 leaders. "Where were you in 1916?" may have disappeared from the Southern political vocabulary, but there are more ways than one to skin a cat.

THE targeting of Mr Bruton as being "unsound on the national question" helps to conceal Fianna Fail's own seismic shift. For the adoption by Fianna Fail of the "consent" clause, which underpins the reforming aspects of the Downing Street Declaration and allows a majority in Northern Ireland to decide its future, has been the greatest political change of recent years.

Evidence of dissatisfaction has been slow in coming. But the day Fianna Fail looked beaten in the Donegal by-election, Harry Blaney's director of elections said the result would force a total reappraisal of Fianna Fail's policy. And he called on Mr Ahern to, once again, seek a date for a British withdrawal.

Bertie Ahern has been supportive of the Government in the past. And he behaved courageously in his outspoken criticisms of Sinn Fein and of the IRA after the breach of the ceasefire. There is no question of his abandoning the bipartisan policy on Northern Ireland which has, operated in the Dail for the past nine years.

That policy, however, allows for criticism of Government actions. This was clearly the case when John Bruton, Mary Harney and Proinsias De Rossa told Albert Reynolds he was wasting his time in trying to secure an IRA ceasefire back in 1994.

As leader of Fianna Fail, Mr Ahern has a duty to the party. And, with a general election due next year, he has to maintain Fianna Fail as "the mainstream republican movement in this country" while guarding against seats being lost to Sinn Fein in Border counties.

The word coming back from cumann meetings in recent weeks indicated dissatisfaction with the Government's handling of the peace, process and - by inference - with Mr Ahern's equally hard line on the IRA.

TWO months ago, Fianna Fail warned that the republican movement faced a parting of the ways: "It can break away from the rest of nationalist Ireland and pursue its paramilitary path in violence or it can work with other nationalist parties for a political settlement." The message is still there, but expressed in softer, more understanding, terms.

In Sunday's speech, it would seem Mr Ahern was taking out political insurance in advance of the June 10th all-party talks: hoping for the best from the IRA, but preparing for the worst. His approach was supported by the parliamentary party and, yesterday he emphasised continuing bipartisanship by condemning the Hammersmith Bridge bombing in London.

Apart from some crude political name-calling, the damaging aspect of Mr Ahern's address of Sunday last was a failure to recognise and to publicly support the real political achievements of this Government since the Canary Wharf bombing in securing a firm date for all-party talks and negotiating tough ground rules for negotiation.

Fianna Fail could not be expected to surrender its claim as leader of nationalist Ireland to interlopers like Fine Gael and the Labour Party. But some generosity of spirit would not have gone amiss in the present fraught circumstances.