Opposition parties know real battle lies in gaps between them

Potential movement in votes between would-be governing parties will generate plenty of ire

LABOUR’S MOST eloquent and poetic advocate left frontline politics this week. Michael D Higgins is retiring from Dáil Éireann to spend more time with his bid for the presidency. His valedictory speech on Tuesday night has already become a YouTube sensation.

Some of the other contributions from the Labour Party’s frontline spokespeople this week were a lot less poetic. As the election campaign kicks off, Labour is getting increasingly abusive in its language and its new tougher tone is directed primarily at Sinn Féin and other left-wing parties and Independents. These have become Labour’s new best enemies. The tone Labour is adopting and the focus of its sharp censure suggests the party is getting afraid, very afraid of those coming up on its left shoulder.

On last Sunday night's The Week in Politicson RTÉ 1 television, Róisín Shortall and Martin Ferris went at it hammer and tongs. Shortall rejected suggestions there should be a realignment of the Irish political system in this election, and that she should come out in favour of a post-election agreement with left-wing groups. Arguing that the country needed stable government, Shortall was dismissive of what she called the "ragbag of Independents and other hard-left groupings that are now forming". When pulled up by Ferris on the ragbag and ultra-left description, she repeated it, characterising Ferris and other left-wing colleagues as "a motley crew".

In a panel discussion on Monday morning’s Pat Kenny programme on RTÉ Radio One, Labour’s Pat Rabbitte saved his best soundbites to fire at Sinn Féin’s Pearse Doherty, characterising the Donegal deputy as a “snake oil salesman” who was “offering facile solutions”.

If these exchanges were unusually tense, then those between Labour's Joan Burton and the Socialist Party's Joe Higgins on Monday evening's Tonight with Vincent Browneon TV3 were downright hostile. Early in the programme, Burton had been similarly dismissive, referring to "Joe and his outfit" and their "erstwhile allies in Sinn Féin". About halfway into the programme, the debate disintegrated into a no holds barred Burton-Higgins slanging match.

When Higgins claimed Labour had abandoned its motion of no confidence in the government in order to facilitate the passage of the Finance Bill, Burton lost it and called Higgins a liar. “That’s a lie,” she said, “You are now lying, you are using political lies.” When Higgins retorted, saying: “She’s off again,” Burton replied: “Don’t speak to me in that derogatory way . . . perhaps you have trouble treating women as equals.” The exchanges continued in that vein. Things became so stormy that, in an ironic twist, Vincent Browne himself had to intervene to ask Burton to stop haranguing Higgins and to let him finish his point.

Even allowing for the bear pit format of that particular programme and the edge that often arises between those who compete in the same constituency, these were extraordinary exchanges. These clips have now also become a hit on YouTube, with almost 60,000 views by Friday lunchtime.

These Labour-left encounters were perhaps the most significant happening of this pre-campaign week, notwithstanding the fact that they occurred simultaneously with the election of a new Fianna Fáil leader.

Indeed, it is striking how little firepower the two main Opposition parties have deployed against Fianna Fáil of late. They did of course go through the formalities and there has been the usual squabble over leaders’ debates, but more often than not the focus of Fine Gael spokespersons is Labour, and that of Labour spokespersons is occasionally Fine Gael, but primarily on parties to the left. It is clear both Labour and Fine Gael realise the real battle in this campaign and the place where there may be most movement is along the axis between Fine Gael and Labour, and between Labour and its left-wing opponents.

Several polling agencies have been out in the field doing research in recent days, and over the next week we are likely to see a series of published polls which will form a baseline against which we can measure movement during the election campaign itself. Until we see these polls it is impossible to assess the cumulative impact of the tumultuous events of the last fortnight on Fianna Fáil’s vote in particular.

The controversies around the initial vote of confidence in Brian Cowen, the farcical events around the attempted Cabinet reshuffle and the circumstances giving rise to Cowen’s ultimate resignation can only have played badly for his party. The collapse of the Government with the Green Party withdrawal, the forced truncating of the Finance Bill and the bringing forward again of the election date would also have done harm.

As against that, one would have to think Micheál Martin’s elevation to the party leadership will have given the party some initial bounce, not least because with his apology and talk of reform he has at least got the rhetoric right. The difficulty may be that any gains for Fianna Fáil from the change to a new leader may have done no more than offset the further losses caused by the circumstances in which the previous leader fell.

The movement in the Fianna Fáil vote, if any, is less significant, however, than that between Sinn Féin, Labour and Fine Gael. If Labour finds itself further squeezed between a surge for Sinn Féin and socialists on the one hand and for Fine Gael on the other, then Labour’s verbal assaults on its opponents are likely to get even angrier.

While anger is the emotion most likely to resonate with the electorate currently, voters may prefer to see that anger vented on their behalf rather than in political squabbles.