The removal of a Taoiseach from office can be a long and painful process, as both Charles Haughey and Albert Reynolds found to their cost. Now their successor, Bertie Ahern, is struggling to retain the confidence of the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party and the public at large. He received qualified support last night from the leader of the Progressive Democrats, Michael McDowell, who judged his action in accepting personal payments to be an honest error of judgment, but neither dishonest nor corrupt. He believed "with the Taoiseach", he said, that the payments in question should now be fully refunded with interest.
After six days of stunning silence, this was a vital intervention designed to steady the Coalition Government. With a general election in sight, the leaders of all parties in the Dáil are acutely aware that a false move or a serious miscalculation could have dire consequences. That is as much the case for Fine Gael and the Labour Party as it is for the PDs. The Taoiseach enjoys such a high level of popularity with the public that all leaders are judging the public mood just as much, if not more than, they are judging the bizarre set of circumstances which compromise the Taoiseach.
But, the storm still rages. The leader of Fine Gael, Enda Kenny, was the first prominent politician to say that Mr Ahern's position as Taoiseach could become untenable. The Labour Party leader, Pat Rabbitte, saw Mr McDowell's decision as "fateful".
It was interesting that the new Tánaiste, like the Opposition leaders, believes that a line has not been drawn in the sand on the whole saga of the payments to Mr Ahern while he was minister for finance in 1993. On no less than four occasions in his supplied script, he offered PD support "based on what the Taoiseach has stated" and "in the light of what the Taoiseach has said". He provided himself and his party with wriggle room in the event of other disclosures.
Whether that will be enough to justify Mr McDowell's signature gesture in climbing up a pole in Ranelagh with the poster "Single Party Government - No Thanks" during the last general election is another matter.
At the opening of a new Dáil session, the exchanges between Mr Ahern and the Opposition party leaders could hardly have been more fraught. The Taoiseach was fighting for his political life; his opponents for an opportunity to serve in government.
Mr Kenny cut to the core of the whole issue in his well-judged round of questioning of the Taoiseach. Was it wrong for a serving minister for finance to accept monies from business friends for any purpose? He did not get the right answer. Mr McDowell and his parliamentary party found the actions of Mr Ahern's friends to be "ill-advised" and found their motives benevolent. They also opined that, in the sphere of public affairs, an individual is not as free as others to accept such well-intentioned assistance. They didn't find the payments wrong either.