PROINSIAS De Rossa used to be a revolutionary. Now he's an evolutionary. Time not revolution, changes the system - or so it seems from inside government.
He had anticipated being in government after the forthcoming general election but not as soon and in such circumstances as arose in late 1994.
He had been an opposition TD since 1982 and showed no sign of moving from that unenviable position.
But the turmoil in the Fianna Fail-Labour alliance in late 1994 cast him suddenly into the unlikely role of Cabinet Minister.
In spite of its "misgivings and apprehensions", Democratic Left agreed to participate in the new Rainbow Coalition.
It had "a responsibility to provide stability" and a chance to see its policies implemented, he says.
"In terms of going into a Department, it was a completely new experience: I have to say, a surprisingly pleasant experience. I found the Department of Social Welfare extremely open to new ideas and willing to take on board the policies that I was interested in.
"I was probably more interested in policy development than technical issues. The Department has responded very well to that."
The Department was not resistant to change but he met what he calls "a drag factor", where civil servants felt it necessary "and are obliged" to point out the disadvantages attached to certain notions.
"I found that, often times, proposals that I might bring forward are improved through such discussions and pet ideas I might have had which seemed very simple and straightforward in fact are not all that simple and straightforward."
BUT whatever about drag factors, the Minister is a powerful and influential politician and, while the Department may have "a view" on an issue, it is the Minister's wishes that it prevail.
Ministerial power is different to the kind of authority he wields as leader of a political party.
"I do believe that power and influence also [have] responsibilities. The fact is that any Department or at least most Departments have a knowledge and expertise in the area they are operating that I, or no Minister, could hope to have."
The public image of the Department - 50 years old this year - has changed dramatically in recent times, he contends. Gone are the days when a hostile system seemed determined to pull claimants through a labyrinth of bureaucracy before parting with a paltry payment.
A public opinion survey conducted in 1995 showed a high satisfaction rating with the Department among those who depend on its services, the Minister says. The "vast majority" found it friendly and helpful.
"There is a culture in the Department of Social Welfare nowadays which seeks to assist the person that comes seeking information.
One of the strongest criticisms of the Department is that it has failed to respond to the changes in Irish society.
Originally established to tide people through a period of unemployment, between jobs, it now deals with generational joblessness.
Mr De Rossa insists it has responded to these demands.
"Less than a third of its expenditure is spent in relation to unemployment. By far and away most payments are in support of the elderly, the family and the sick.
"Unemployment payments, while significant, are not the major element of our payments," he says.
WHEN he took up office, 1 per cent of payments were on work incentives such as family supplement and back-to-work allowances but that figure has risen to 10 per cent.
"We are now in a new period in the Irish economy. Jobs are being created at the rate of roughly 1,000 a week.
"There is a greater degree of confidence and self-confidence among people out there looking for work as well. Less and less do you hear the complaint, `well, there is no point looking for work because there is none there'.
The argument that people are better off on social welfare is no longer true, he insists. "People are always better off at work now, through a range of supports that the Department is providing. You are always better off taking a job."
The stubborn core of long-term employment is a legacy of "economic mismanagement by successive governments", he argues.
He cites the measures undertaken to counter the problem: the £80-a-week job-start programme; the local employment service now being developed.
Erosion of the problem is going to be a slow process but one that has to be done "because you can't abandon a generation to a half-life on unemployment".
Why then, if Ireland is on a job creation roll, are the unemployment figures not failing dramatically?
"What people could not understand was how we were creating all these jobs and our unemployment statistics on the Live Register were static and sometimes rising.
"There is a variety of reasons, one of them being fraud. But the other very real one is that the Live Register includes 30,000 people who are in work part-time. It includes 20,000 who are signing for credits."
He reckons that 90 per cent of those signing on the Live Register will be off it in a year but there is a "hard core" whose skills are no longer relevant to the present who are discouraged and need "one-to-one help to access the jobs that are becoming available".
After over two years in Social Welfare, he really thinks he has brought change to the system. He claims to be the "driving force" in the development of the Anti-Poverty Strategy which will be unveiled tomorrow.
In theory, the strategy dictates that every Government Department poverty-proof its policies and it is, according to Mr De Rossa, the "key" to combating poverty "in all its dimensions, not just income adequacy".
The Conference of Religious in Ireland estimates there are one million people on or below the poverty line.
The Minister does not argue with its accuracy, though it depends on where one fixes that line. After all, he says, he was responsible for the ESRI study on adequate income in relation to the Commission on Social Welfare recommendations.
"If you set the line at 60 per cent of average industrial earnings, there are about a million below the poverty line. Even if you set the measure at a lower level and say it is only 500,000, it is still too many.
He identifies lack of income and education as primary contributors to poverty. He says he "makes no secret" of his opposition to the abolition of third-level fees but declines to illuminate the depth of his aversion, merely say"ing he "argued my case where it needed to be argued".
But does he still hold that it was a mistake? He sighs.
"Well, it would be wrong to declare it a mistake now in the absence of evidence to that effect. We will have to see how it works through. There is a strong argument that it will have the Same impact in relation to getting people into third level as the free fees at second level did in the 1960s. I have no doubt at all that the provision of free education at second level is very much part of the prosperity we now have in the State at the moment."
HAT about the introduction of a minimum income, the CORI proposal which would guarantee a payment of £70 per week to every adult in the State and a flat tax rate of 43 per cent?
"It depends on what you mean by minimum income. There is a lot of confusion among the general, public and some commentators who confuse adequate income, a basic income and minimum wage. I am seeking as Minister to ensure that people who are on low pay at work or whose exclusive income is from the Department of Social Welfare have enough to meet certain basic needs of living a life that is decent."
Describing the CORI proposal for a basic income as effectively "a revolutionary transformation of how this society actually provides income for people", he says it is not politically realisable. He cannot foresee any political party facing the electorate proposing a 43 per cent tax rate.
On the other hand, the Minister is seeking to "move our system in the direction of ensuring that people have an adequate income
But is revolutionary change possible? He has argued very strongly in the past for the basic income approach. In theory, it is still a good idea. But the past was opposition and the present is Government.
"I have to say that, having got up close to the system, not just in the Department of Social Welfare but on how government works and how decisions are made and how Departments interact ... I don't think you can take basic income as an idea and simply impose it on the system overnight. There are things you can do which certainly move in that direction, and I have been doing that."
The Minister proudly cites a 50-per cent improvement in child benefit -the only universal payment we have - as one of the engines that should drive that process in the right direction.
Meanwhile, if current economic growth continues - he thinks it will for 10 years anyway - the unemployment problem is "probably going to be negligible in the years to come".
"What is the purpose, then, of basic income?" he asks.
Nor is this utopia on some distant planet or in some faraway time.
If returned to government, would he like to return to Social Welfare? It's something he has not considered but he has "no obsession" with the brief. He has put certain things in train and is certain that another Minister from the Rainbow Coalition, of course - would carry that forward.
Given that Democratic Left appears to have jelled so well with Fine Gael in Government, what is the difference between the parties now?
"I suppose I could go through a lot of different things but I am not particularly anxious to identify differences. Fine Gael would identify themselves as a Christian Democratic party and we would describe ourselves as a Socialist party"
DEMOCRATIC Left has a greater commitment to the idea of a secular society than Fine Gael. This manifests itself in the area of education primarily and again, he puts it rather delicately, there was "debate" in Cabinet on the Employment Equality Bill which has been referred to the Supreme Court.
In fact, Mr De Rossa and his party took grave exception to Section 37 of that legislation which allowed religious institutions to hire and fire on the basis that an employee might be undermining the ethos of their particular institution. Ms Kathleen Lynch, one of the two party backbenchers threatened to table her own amendments to the Bill at Committee stage.
Secular society apart, Fine Gael and Democratic Left would also differ on the degree of emphasis on the sharing of wealth in society. His party would "instinctively" _ emphasise the maintenance of semi-State bodies. But having said that, there are enough areas of agreement on which the parties can operate happily together in Government.
Democratic Left supporters will, he predicts, give their subsequent votes to Fine Gael and Labour to return this Government. He never thought he would see the day when his followers would tell him they were voting Fine Gael "but there you are".
He likes Government with Fine Gael and Labour not like those awful months in 1982 when he, Joe Sherlock and Paddy Gallagher supported a minority Fianna Fail government. That coloured his experience because "I never knew where I stood with Fianna Fail", he recalls.
"You would sit down, discuss an issue with them, get agreement and hardly walk out the door and it was gone. Constant manoeuvrings and so on. My experience in this Government is that you make an agreement and that's it's done.
He agrees that they have hit the jackpot in terms of the right emotional mix; it sounds like a good, marriage, actually. Nobody "seeks to dominate".
IN A LESS tranquil area, the peace process, he has been accused of having such an overwhelming dislike for the republicans that his influence has been largely negative. This is absolutely untrue, he insists. Only last week, the SDLP praised his role in putting forward constructive views on Northern Ireland.
He had "bent over backwards" to accommodate the IRA when it called its ceasefire in August 1994. He regarded it as a watershed in republican history
But his antipathy to the physical force aspect of Irish nationalism is born of "the knowledge that it is 59 totally destructive of progressive politics" and any possibility of reconciliation and co-existence.
Those in the republican movement struggling to re-establish a ceasefire have come to the realisation 25 years too late. But while he "mourns" the 3,000 and more who died in that period, it is better late than never.
"As long as the republican movement puts the unity of the republican movement above everything else, the progressive elements in it will be hostage to the worse elements in it," he says.
The peace process negotiations resume on June 3rd and all the parties will be moving on "and Sinn Fein will be left behind if they don't achieve a ceasefire". Realistically, the elements of an "accommodation" are already there in the Downing Street Declaration and the Framework Document.
There is an acceptance "on all sides", apart from Sinn Fein, that there will be no change in the constitutional status of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom in the absence of consent there.
"The other element clearly would be a democratic assembly in Northern Ireland where elected politicians would govern and there would be a real and substantial Irish dimension." Mr Rossa is "depressed" at the intransigence of unionists and their tardy approach to the Stormont talks.
On a separate matter, he declines to discuss the ramifications of his recent libel action against Independent Newspapers.
"It has not yet concluded and until such time as it does, I do not propose to comment on it.