Be careful what you wish for, it might come true.
Last week's TNS mrbi poll told Fine Gael and Labour what they wanted to hear. Together, the two parties command 44 per cent of the vote. If their vote holds up, both parties could form a government, perhaps with a third party or a few Independents. But could doesn't mean should. The economy will test the compatibility of Fine Gael and Labour in several ways. In the 1980s rising unemployment debt and taxation brought down a government based largely on antipathy to Fianna Fáil. The 1994 to 1997 coalition was luckier.
When ideology reared its ugly head, a booming economy and a bulging Exchequer was at hand to find and fund solutions. Fine Gael and Labour may not be so fortunate between 2007 and 2012 should they be in government, and may find themselves being judged on their economic cohesion and competence rather than on their dislike of Fianna Fáil.
The economic situation facing the next government won't be as bad as the 1980s, but won't be a bed of roses either. Between 2007 and 2012, current rampant borrowing will slow dramatically, bringing down consumption and investment. By then SSIAs will have fallen through the economy like grain through a goose. Inflation may also be higher and even if it isn't our competitiveness relative to emerging economies will have deteriorated further, bringing more layoffs in its train. We will by then be net contributors to the EU, placing a further burden on the Exchequer. Interest rates will be at least a percentage point higher. And these are just the certainties. With 250,000 people working in construction and Government tax revenues increasingly reliant on a housing market that many now say is overvalued, there is risk of even worse.
On the face of it Labour remains a party of the left, albeit softer than before, and remains strongly linked to the trade union movement. As Michael Gallagher's scholarly book on Fine Gael, Days of Blue Loyalty, shows, Fine Gael voters are, on economic questions at least, largely on the right.
Taxation is the first line of potential cleavage. If ESRI forecasts are true, then in the absence of policy change the economy will generate about €36 billion in additional revenue. The PDs says it will give about €5 billion of this back to taxpayers in income tax. These will be a combination of tax rate cuts and an increasing of tax bands and credits. It will probably announce further tax cuts before the election, some of which will be implemented at the time of the next budget. Reductions in indirect taxation and a reform of stamp duty may be on the cards.
On taxation, Fine Gael and Labour positions are not a million miles apart.
Labour would cut taxes by widening tax bands, but has not yet committed to automatic indexation of tax bands. It says it would set up a tax commission to review the operation of tax reliefs. Fine Gael's tax policies are so far - in so far as they are specified - similar. Fine Gael is committed to restoring the value of tax credits and bands to what they were in 2002 before inflation eroded them. It is also committed to requiring the Minister for Finance to have an "opening position" of automatically indexing tax credits and bands to the rate of inflation, any departure from which will require a ministerial statement. And its proposal to annually review all taxes, levies and charges by government is similar enough to Labour's idea of a tax commission. Fine Gael's only serious problem with Labour's approach to taxation is Pat Rabbitte's hint that he may raise Capital Gains Tax.
On public sector spending and reform, the divide is bigger. However much he talks about public sector reform, the loudest cheer for Pat Rabbitte's last Labour Party conference speech came when he strongly defended public sector involvement in the health sector. But in a speech to the Irish Nurses Organisation in Killarney in 2004 that would have done Mary Harney proud, Fine Gael's then health spokeswoman Olivia Mitchell had this to say about the role of the public sector in health provision: "It is just impossible for any State service to overcome the inherent inefficiencies and the absence of incentives which characterise a largely State provided system." She went on to say: "It is only with the introduction of competition that we can capture for patients the benefits of the market and ensure that health services benefit from innovation, from financial and operational inefficiencies and from the use of technologies."
But more recently, Fine Gael's Dr John Barton has strongly opposed the policy of using private investment to free up public beds in public hospitals. This is politically necessary for a coalition to work. For Labour and its trade union backers, private sector investment in public hospitals is not on.
But suppressing core instincts - as expressed by Olivia Mitchell - may leave Fine Gael internally divided and externally exposed in government. The same is true for Labour if it accommodates Fine Gael.
Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbitte may paper over such differences in outlook. But who knows how such passions can fester among backbenchers, especially among those who feel passed over for promotion. And even if the economic challenges ahead won't be as bad as the 1980s, political competition will also be fiercer. A future Fine Gael-Labour coalition would definitely exclude Sinn Féin, exposing Labour's left flank to considerable pressure. It would also probably exclude the Progressive Democrats, similarly exposing Fine Gael's right flank.
The changing nature of the electorate is likely to facilitate such divisions. The National Employment Survey, published last week, showed that public sector workers earn 40 per cent more than private sector workers and hints at a growing divide between the two sides of our economy, one of which is broadly aligned with Fine Gael and the other with Labour. As the competitive and protected sectors of our economy square up to each other, Fine Gael and Labour may find that their respective constituents want very different approaches on questions such as public sector pay, privatisation and public sector reform.
Fianna Fáil's sympathy for the public sector and Bertie Ahern's claim to be a socialist on the face of it must be appealing for many Labour voters. At the same time the Progressive Democrats' fondness for the private sector and low taxation is, or at least once was, core Fine Gael thinking. Early in a new century, has the time for a left-right realignment of Irish politics finally arrived?