Back to the political world’s favourite subject. The time is fast approaching – and will arrive probably next week, I think – when decisions have to be made about the election. Whether they will be announced or not is another matter, but the legislative timetable means decisions have to be reached pretty soon.
So both the Taoiseach and Tánaiste – who have been politely(ish) avoiding the subject until now – have big decisions to make. We’ll come back to that. But first, what are the constraints of the timetable?
The Finance Bill, which gives effect to many of the budget decisions, was published on Thursday and will begin its passage through the Oireachtas on Wednesday. The Social Welfare Bill, which underpins other budget measures, including the double-double child benefit and welfare payments, will also commence next week. It will be done and dusted by the end of October.
Officials are working to the following dates for the passage of the Finance Bill: second stage in the Dáil – next Wednesday, October 16th; committee stage – November 5th; report and final stage – November 20th; Seanad – November 27th; Seanad committee stage – December 4th; Seanad report and final stage – December 11th.
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If there is going to be a November – or even early December – election, this process has to be concertinaed into the next month. Legislative and constitutional requirements mean that a dissolution of the Dáil must take place between 18 and 25 days before polling day. So if you want polling day on, say November 15th, you count back to October 24th for the latest possible dissolution and October 16th for the earliest.
November 15th has long been the date I thought most likely, but that is now slipping back by a week or two, or even three. That gives the Government up to November 16th for a dissolution of the Dáil if it went as late as Saturday, December 7th for polling day. You can be sure there is a spreadsheet with all of this spelt out clearly in the Taoiseach’s office. And in the Tánaiste’s, for that matter.
Either way, the Government has to cram a lot of parliamentary business (don’t forget there are supplementary estimates that are essential too) into a few weeks. Short-circuiting the normal Oireachtas processes in this way requires the support of the Coalition parties. Which is why both Micheál Martin and Simon Harris have big decisions to make.
I think Harris wants an early election because it is obviously in his interests. Martin has to decide whether he will accede to that request, if and when it comes. And then Harris has to decide what he will do if Martin turns him down and holds out for 2025.
Those decisions are not made yet, but this week saw a few things that suggest a 2024 election is more likely to be agreed than not among the Coalition parties.
An opportunist snap of Micheál Martin’s election posters – to the fury of Fianna Fáil and the indescribable delight of Fine Gael – was widely circulated. The poster was adorned with the slogan “Moving Forward Together”. Close observers of the many doorstep interviews given by the Taoiseach will have noticed him slipping this phrase in on Friday. This is trolling of a high order.
Mattie McGrath spoke for the whole Dáil – an unusual occurrence, this – and maybe the rest of us too when he told the Chamber on Tuesday that all the election speculation was driving everyone “demented”. A related point is that the momentum now for a 2024 election is overwhelming – if that goes nowhere, there will be political consequences. All the energy has to go somewhere.
Finally, one of the main reasons for the whole idea – the difficulties of the Government’s principal opponents – only intensified this week.
Facing a welter of questions about the scandal over its former press officer, Sinn Féin disappeared from the plinth; statements on a variety of subjects continued to pour forth from the party press office, but questions went unanswered.
[ Sinn Féin to face further questions over references for child sex offenderOpens in new window ]
Confronted in the Dáil, Mary Lou McDonald indicated that in any debate Sinn Féin would be pointing to instances of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil politicians giving character references to people convicted of crimes. This gives Sinn Féin something to say, but having something to say is not the same as having a defence. It is neither an answer to the questions the party faces about its own conduct nor a comparable situation.
And as a letter writer to The Irish Times pointed out during the week, is Mary Lou’s defence really that Sinn Féin is only as bad as everyone else? Makes it a little harder to offer “change” when the election comes.
Sinn Féin’s position is a difficult one because it rests on propositions that are hard to believe: that nobody noticed the press officer they had chucked out because he was a suspected sex offender even when he was straight in front of them at a photocall attended by no more than a handful of people; that the HR manager never brought the references to her bosses’ attention when the British Heart Foundation raised them with her; and, most of all, that in a party that likes to know what is going on, nobody knew anything at all.
These propositions perhaps cannot be disproved; but they are incredible. And that inevitably damages the party; repeatedly saying things that nobody believes always does.
The difficulties continued this week when one of McDonald’s TDs jumped ship, and will continue again next week when the Dáil discusses child protection. All of this matters not just in itself but because it stops the party from talking about what it wants to talk about: housing, housing, housing.
You don’t have to be the world’s greatest political strategist to see that all this bolsters the case for an early election.
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