LEADERS IN WAITING: As the general election nears, the Green Party leader, Trevor Sargent, talks to Political Reporter Mark Hennessy in our continuing series of interviews with the main party leaders. Monday: Gerry Adams of Sinn Féin
MH: Whom do you see as the Greens' major competition?
TS: I think apathy, to be quite honest. For people interested in planet's future, there have got to be questions raised about whether other parties have thought about what happens when the oil runs out, or when, as a consequence, the financial markets collapse. And what happens when the majority of the world already suffering mass deprivation decide that they are having no more of it and with weapons of mass destruction,or any other form of violence that we saw a flavour of on September 11th, start to kick back.
MH: How do you explain apathy against that woeful landscape?
TS: I suppose it is a human survival instinct to try not to imagine the worst until you are faced with it. We are saying that if you wait for a multiple of September 11ths or a multiple of the famines that we have seen, then it will be worse than it has to be.
MH: In a climate where people are becoming more selfish, more materialistic, you preach a rather depressing creed.
TS: I know that it seems not to countenance the fun and frolics of the Celtic Tiger. But it is a hope that keeps me motivated that there is a way of having a good quality of life, with education, health and all the basics without jeopardising the future. That is a sign of long-term hope, rather than saying "I'll be dead before things really get bad". The election is important, no doubt about that, given that the political landscape has become more and more indistinguishable. Our message is very different. Our challenge is to get that out there in as understandable a way as possible. The only way to do that sometimes is to put down facts which on face value do sound depressing.
MH: Given that your priorities are so different to other parties, how could you work with them?
TS: I have no choice unless there is going to be an overall Green majority. What I have got to try and do is measure where people's concerns are and then make the connections with the bigger picture so that people identify with the need for the kind of policies that will turn us away from catastrophe.
MH: What kind of policies are necessary in the life of the next Dáil?
TS: Energy consumption is the biggest challenge. The energy graphs are going up like the side of Carrantuohill. Wave and wind energy needs to be pushed centre stage. It is already starting, but it is only still on the fringes. It needs to be the norm. That will not happen unless the Greens are in government, because vested interests will be too great.
Look at the peat fired stations in the midlands. It was pushed through with the Minister for Foreign Affairs lobbying hard the Minister for Public Enterprise to allow the stations come under the most bizarre definition of sustainable energy. The Government just rolled over. These things have to be faced down. The needs of the midlands could well have been met without giving in to that.
The Arklow Banks windfarm is a private business that only needed the Government's blessing. For the sake of writing a foreshore licence, Frank Fahey got amazing good PR out of it, and good luck to him. What we're talking is far more than good PR. The National Development Plan is broken down roughly two-thirds on roads and one-third on public transport. We are going to have to reverse that. That obviously means restrictions on non-essential private travel. Town and city-centre driving is not possible in many European countries now. Absolutely, there will have to be bans. Every town and city will have to have its own blueprint worked through with traders, tourism and other interests.
We have to resist creating unrealistic expectations, first of all. Transparency would be fundamental to us. Hopefully, people will see us as people who are in touch with daily needs, but motivated by a longer-term view. People would be able to look their children in the eye and say that there is somebody representing future needs. Anybody who goes to the trouble of having a child obviously doesn't go down that road lightly. I would ask people to think that far ahead, to exercise a similar long-term view when they vote.
MH: What would the Greens need as a minimum to go into coalition?
TS: We are going to negotiate, but there will be a number of non-negotiables like indicators to measure quality of life. Incineration and large superdumps would be out.
Organic farming will be a priority, up to 30 per cent in time. The writing is on the wall for farming. It's on its knees. In pretending that the cheque in the post situation can continue, the Department of Agriculture is not just deluding itself but it is also doing a great disservice to many farmers. If enlargement proceeds, the eastern European countries will put out many, many hands. Organic vegetable demand here is enormous and we are importing between 70per cent and 80 per cent of our needs.
MH: In government, what jobs would you need?
TS: It will be a case of having to live without some as much as anything else. I think 1½ ministries would have be a minimum to provide some cohesion. If we are going to effect the change we need, then environment would be an important one. There would need to be some role in the Department of Finance, maybe at Minister of State level or, indeed, the Department of Public Enterprise.
Obviously, education would be a particular interest of my own given my teaching background. There is huge amount of change needed there. It very centralised, very inefficient and very frustrating. Micheál Martin was able to put a braver face on the system he inherited than Michael Woods. But it's more style than substance. On ASTI-like strikes, I would certainly make sure that the teaching unions, if possible, were kept on board.
I would hope as a teacher myself that I would be able to appeal to the sense of responsibility that is intrinsic in teachers towards their pupils. I have no doubt that there are some who need to pull up their socks, who may even need to ask themselves whether teaching is their vocation.
MH: When you look across the Opposition benches or on the government side, how many people do you see that you could work with?
TS: It depends on how good the day is, I think. From time to time, you get flashes of interesting contributions and then it sinks into a morass of the mundane. John Bruton was good recently on the Sustainable Energy Bill. He had no doubt about the foolishness of sinking a lot of capital into peat-fired stations that will cost us in the end. It wasn't what his other party colleagues wanted to hear, mind you.
MH: But he won't be across a Cabinet table from you after May, if you get there.
TS: This is a sad reality, perhaps, for Fine Gael.
MH: Your preferred shape of government would be Fine Gael, Labour, yourselves. Would that be fair?
TS: It probably would be easier to look at the current Opposition as a template. Fianna Fáil has dug itself into so many holes. Notwithstanding the claim made by the Progressive Democrats that they were keeping an eye on FF, its golden circle has still been able to shine in fairly murky corners.
MH: How do you explain so the fact that Fianna Fáil has been bounding along in the polls?
TS: Society has a fairly chequered membership itself and all sorts of people vote for FF. I am sure many of them are very principled and very romantic in their belief that the Soldiers of Destiny will deliver them to the promised land. But if they sit back from their infatuation and look a little closer at what kind of future the Soldiers of Destiny will hand to their children, they might leave them to their place in history. The problems lie with the policies that they have not introduced as much as the ones that they have. The gap between rich and poor is now wider than ever before.
MH: Do you see any way that you could work with FF?
TS: The ability of politicians in the larger parties to reinvent themselves never ceases to amaze me. Fianna Fáil with Labour was one type of government, Fianna Fáil with the Progressive Democrats is another. If they had to, they would bite their bottom lip and smile through it. If they claim credit for sustainable policies and it happens, I won't mind.
MH: What concerns do you have about Fine Gael?
TS: Something similar to Fianna Fáil, but Fine Gael has the luxury of Opposition. It is probably easier to contemplate working with them because they don't have to come back and explain why they changed their minds. Michael Noonan was very successful in his finance portfolio. He showed that he could put his finger on weaknesses and exploit them. But I suppose he is finding it difficult with the expectations that maybe he created himself.
Elections are a roller-coaster. When it starts, FF is going come under more scrutiny. People will think about the type of politicians they are electing. In my own constituency it will be remembered that Ray Burke topped the 1997 poll and has languished since in Dublin Castle. People there have an unspeakable anger. They are angry with themselves for not realising that there was information that they should have seen. The only way I can rationalise it and understand it myself is that FF is bit like the Manchester United of Irish politics. That team is supported by people who don't know much about football.
MH: Why should the public trust the Greens in command of big spending departments, such as environment, when none of you has any experience running anything?
TS: What we have done to date is run a party without anything like the assistance that would be available in government. I would certainly see the need for outside people with expertise. I have no problem at all with the whole concept of programme managers, but you have to explain why they are there. With the greatest respect to people working for years and years in departments they have been operating on assumptions, that certain policies are foregone conclusions. This has to be challenged. To do that, we have to have alternatives.
MH: Has the work on ethics in politics gone far enough?
TS: No. It isn't just about satisfying the public there are no greasy hands in the till or that influence isn't being wielded undemocratically. It is also about operating so transparently that you give example. TDs' expenses, for example, should be receipted. I know it might be an administrative headache, but everybody else has to do it.
MH: You have been in the Dáil for a long time. Do you believe the people around you are fundamentally honest or dishonest?
TS: I think they are fundamentally honest, but they are living in a world that is so fast and which brings them into contact with so many people that they don't get time to take stock of what it is that brought them into politics. Many are vulnerable to both criticism and flattery. In some cases, they can be manipulated because of that. It is up to them not to give in to those temptations, but some obviously have.
MH: Where have you a 50-50 chance of winning? Some argue that the tide has come and gone for the Greens, because Sinn Féin is now trying to win the radical vote?
TS: It would be disastrous if John Gormley and myself did not get back, for a start, and we are taking nothing for granted. I think we have a very strong chance with Mary White in Carlow/Kilkenny and Dan Boyle in Cork South Central. Five or six in a good day. Sure, it has been the case that the Greens have benefited from Sinn Féin transfers. No, I am not yet convinced that Sinn Féin has broken with the past. I think they still draw on a romantic notion of the armed struggle.
There certainly was a link between the IRA and Sinn Féin and there has not been any proof given that it has been ended. The onus of proof is on Sinn Féin, which probably means that the best way of putting the whole history behind is for the IRA to disband.
(This is an edited version of the interview)