Labour has pledged not to increase taxes and to change direction on health as they try to convince voters that they and their alternative government alliance are worth backing, writes Mark Brennock, Chief Political Correspondent
With just over a year to go to the expected election date, Labour has moved to close off the most consistent line of attack used against them by the Government parties: That they will increase taxes.
"Taxes are down and will stay down," declared Pat Rabbitte in his Saturday night speech. "In a successful economy with buoyant revenues, there is no need to increase taxation and Labour has no intention of doing so." Gone are Rabbitte's suggestions of recent years that taxes on wealth might be increased under Labour. The Government parties appear to have convinced voters that any tax increases - even on wealth and windfall capital gains - would cause grave economic damage. So ruling out all tax increases - even on wealth - is almost certainly the right thing to do electorally.
Ictu general secretary David Begg wrote in this newspaper on Saturday of the particular Irish resistance to taxation due to "the legacy of an unjust tax system, which provided the wealthy with a plethora of tax shelters to avoid paying their fair share". It will take time to rebuild public confidence in the tax system, he said.
Labour's decision is a recognition of this. "What is needed now is not more taxation but fair taxation", said Rabbitte.
Last weekend the Green Party also pledged not to increase income tax or corporation tax. The regular attack lines on the Opposition parties will have to be revised.
Labour is accused regularly of moving to a bland centrist position so as to accommodate its election partner, Fine Gael, and the taxes pledge will be seen by its critics as part of this. But Rabbitte also set out on Saturday to define some clear differences between Labour and the other parties. Particularly on health, he pledged to abandon key elements of the Government's approach.
The Government has insisted for years that the A&E "national emergency" is to be solved primarily through reforming hospital and staff practices, rather than providing more beds. But while promising reform, Rabbitte insisted: "There is no answer to the chaos in A&E without providing more beds." And the Government has begun a determined programme of using tax breaks to help developers build private hospitals and clinics on public hospital grounds. "We will maintain hospitals as not-for-profit foundations and we will invest in them."
Rabbitte also sought to rewrite the Government's version of recent economic and political history, which is that economic success began with the election of Fianna Fáil and the PDs to power in 1997. The truth is that since the early 1990s the health of the public finances, economic growth and job creation have improved steadily under successive governments.
Rabbitte sought to claim a large slice of credit for Labour. It was when Labour was last in government (1992-97) "that Ireland made the historic transition from poor country to successful economy". When Labour left office more than a thousand new jobs were being created per week, the public finances were back in surplus and Ireland was becoming fairer, he said.
"Since then the economic progress has been maintained. But the momentum for a fairer Ireland has been stalled," he said. The economy is successful but society is under strain, hard-working families feel they are on a treadmill and the Government "doesn't listen".
Labour is clearly seeking to move political discourse away from the Government's current obsession with economic statistics and towards "quality-of-life" issues. He touched on all the issues that come up on doorsteps and in research carried out by the political parties - health, the cost of childcare, poor public transport, crime and anti-social behaviour.
These were the issues addressed by the many of the party's newer candidates during the Saturday morning session - the centrepiece of the event apart from the leader's speech. Every word uttered by every one of those candidates was scripted in advance. Labour timed this showcasing of its new candidates for the live television slot they were given on Saturday, in recognition of a substantial and often unnoticed problem that could be just around the corner for the party.
For if this Government goes its full term, the average age of the 21 outgoing Labour TDs will be 59 when the general election takes place. After Brendan Howlin's 50th birthday next month and Willie Penrose's in August, Labour will have no Dáil deputy aged under 50. Deputies Joe Sherlock, Séamus Pattison, Breeda Moynihan Cronin and Seán Ryan are retiring and none leaves behind a seat whose retention can be guaranteed.
For Labour therefore the next election is about more than just getting into government. If few of the younger and newer candidates are elected, the party will go into government - or opposition - with an ageing profile and without an injection of the fresh backbench talent needed to present a vibrant image. A mediocre election result will leave a modestly sized parliamentary party of veterans facing the challenge of trying once more to bring about an electoral breakthrough, such as happened under Dick Spring in 1992.
There are good new and young(ish) candidates. Articulate contenders such as Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central), Seán Sherlock (Cork East), Aidan Culhane (Dublin South), Phil Prendergast (Tipperary South), Dominic Hannigan (Meath East) made short policy speeches on crime, health, education and other issues on Saturday. If elected, all will be new TDs who would be noticed.
And because of its age profile, the party needs them badly. Its problem is that recent opinion poll results, if replicated on polling day, would see few elected.
Rabbitte recognised the simple but major challenge himself: "We have been successful in convincing public opinion that there is now the prospect of an alternative government comprising Labour and Fine Gael. We must now convince people to vote for that change." He and his deputy leader Liz McManus addressed directly the regular commentary that Fine Gael and Labour just cannot win the 30 extra seats they need to form a majority government. Rabbitte said that when the campaign begins, voters will see they have a clear credible choice and will come to Fine Gael and Labour in large numbers.
This is the calculation he made three years ago when he set about convincing his party to agree to fighting the next election in alliance with Fine Gael. The success or otherwise of that strategy in getting new TDs elected will determine, not just Labour's short-term future but its long-term health.