Manifestoes are coming thick and fast as we head into “moving week”, the second of this general election campaign, when any decisive shifts are likely to be keenly felt.
Politicians in all parties report a relatively uneventful first week of the campaign, with no breakout issue or unforeseen controversy upsetting the carefully laid plans of each party. Everyone stuck to their campaign grids, doing exactly what they had planned to do. They all reported a public that was politely interested, but not hugely engaged. If all that’s going to change, it will probably do so in the coming days.
Fine Gael and Labour launched their manifestoes on Sunday while Sinn Féin will publish its document on Tuesday, after Monday night’s 10-way (yes, you read that right) leaders’ debate on RTÉ television.
Fine Gael brought everyone to the Horse and Jockey Hotel in Tipperary for the launch of its manifesto, where Taoiseach Simon Harris denied he was throwing election promises around like “snuff at a wake”.
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But the Fine Gael document still contains a welter of spending measures and promised tax cuts. The latest Fine Gael banger is a grant of €1,000 for every baby born in the future (€1,500 for children born into disadvantaged backgrounds) which would be lodged in a savings account for them until they are 18. “It will help get every child off to the best start in life,” said Harris — though how that could be when the money can’t be touched by their parents is unclear.
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The €75 million annual cost is affordable, argues Fine Gael and it’s true that in the greater scheme of things, this is not a make-or-break amount. But like everything else in this bonanza election campaign, it relies on the incredibly fortunate Irish economic status quo continuing — strong economic growth, big corporation tax revenues and international stability. If something happens to disrupt all that, these manifestoes are going to look redundant.
The Irish Times/Ipsos B&A opinion poll on Friday and Saturday showed Fine Gael is in advance of the pack (the Sunday Times poll suggested a smaller but still clear lead) and there’s a bit of a target on Simon Harris’s back as far as the rest of the parties are concerned.
Fianna Fáil stepped up its attacks on the Fine Gael performance on law and order, while other parties, including Labour, targeted Simon Harris’s fondness for eye-catching promises. The €1,000-for-babies plan — the “Acorn” scheme — was dismissed as a “gimmick” by Labour leader Ivana Bacik, while her finance spokesman Ged Nash gassed about Harris’s “Charlie McCreevy and Brian Cowen tribute act”.
“Most of us remember the hangover from that particular party,” said Nash. “And we don’t want to go there again.”
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