Listeners to The Irish Times Inside Politics podcast were asked to submit questions to Hugh Linehan for his interview with Taoiseach Simon Harris. This is an edited version of their conversation. Listen to the full podcast here, on your podcast app or visit the Inside Politics page for all our episodes.
Simon Harris says no to a 'four or five' party coalition - and answers your questions
Josh: I’m a 25-year-old who has spent most of my life hovering around the poverty line. I was the first in my family to receive a college degree and to hold down long-term employment. I now earn €40,000 per year. Why is it that now I feel the poorest I have ever felt? And why should I believe in Fine Gael’s plans for the future when your party has governed for so long?
Taoiseach: Firstly, to acknowledge that Josh, and indeed everyone in Ireland, has been living through the biggest inflationary crisis since the 1970s. And everywhere I go in Ireland people are pointing out to me that they’re really feeling the pinch. And they’re leaving me in absolutely no doubt that while inflation is falling, and economists can point to all of these signals, that hasn’t yet translated into terms of real benefits and people’s living standards at the end of the week and the like.
So what Josh is feeling is reflective, I think, of what many people right across our country are feeling...But I’d also say this: we’re now at a point where we genuinely do have both resources and plans. And it’s rare in politics to have both.
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We have the money and we have the plans to really make great inroads. So whether that’s in terms of Josh’s take-home pay, whether it’s in terms of an ability to buy a home and the supports we can put in place, if he plans on having a family the childcare costs that we can reduce, or he mentioned college, even that ability to phase out the student registration fee. So there are many reasons to be positive and hopeful.
So, I do want him to know, I really want him to know, and I feel passionate about this, that there is now a trajectory. Inflation is falling. There is money in the kitty. A lot of people have said to me, ‘it’s grand the one-off things you’ve tried to do to help us make ends meet but can you make some of them permanent, Simon?’
Can you reduce the structural costs in Ireland? That’s what we’re trying to do through the increased housing supply, changes in childcare, reducing costs of education, and continuing to reduce personal tax.
[ Simon Harris rejects coalition with multi-party left-wing alliance ]
Christine: If Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil form the basis for the next government which of the smaller parties would you prefer to join the government? What do you make of the Labour plan to assemble a centre left, sort of red-green platform before speaking to you or to anybody?
Taoiseach: I mean, the first thing I want to say is we need to be really careful here because there’s an awful lot of people somewhat kind of predicting or calling the outcome of the election with great certainty. I am not one of those people. A vote hasn’t been cast and I’m still very much in the business of looking people in the whites of their eyes right across the country and respectfully asking for their vote for Fine Gael, and others are doing the like.
I suppose my party has a track record of working with many political parties. We’ve worked in a three-party coalition, one that I’m proud to lead today. My party’s position on who we won’t go into government with is clear, won’t come as a surprise to any of your listeners, that we won’t go into government with Sinn Féin.
That’s not to say I’m being pejorative or rude, it’s just genuinely being honest. We have policy differences that we won’t go in with them on, on those grounds. But other than that I am open to speaking to parties, obviously after the election…So I don’t mean this in any way rudely, but I think this idea of the smaller parties kind of talking to each other after the election is interesting on one level but there’s a couple of issues about it.
I think, one, it might have been preferable if that happened before the election. So you’d actually go before the people with a common platform. So there could, so at least we could interpret the mandate that the public had given a platform. I think that would have been one thing.
And then the second thing is I don’t think anyone wants to see a coalition with four, five or six parties in it. I think that wouldn’t be good at this moment in time. I think we need a stable government. I’m currently leading and managing a three-party coalition. We’ve managed to deliver five budgets and that, but you start adding in four and five parties. I think that’s not very stable...My preference is to have a stable government.
Hugh Linehan: Which are the red line items and which aren’t?
Taoiseach: It’s a really valid question. Just answer the first bit by saying this, the people are sovereign. And the more support that people give to a political party the more of its agenda it can progress. I met farmers recently and they said ‘why do you have a three-party coalition?’ Well, the answer is because we didn’t have enough seats to have a two-party coalition. So, I mean, the reality is if people go out and vote the way they wish to vote, if they wish to see the Fine Gael mandate enhanced in the next Dáil, they do need to vote for it. And if they don’t they need to vote a different way.That’s just a point I’d make. We deal with the outcome of what the people decide and not the other way around.
In terms of the economic challenges, I mean we’re having an interesting election campaign in one way that almost all of the discussion is around the spending of extra money, and my own party included has published plans to show how we would spend extra money.
Now, we’re promising to spend less than many other parties, and we’re keeping within the Department of Finance 5 per cent spending rule on current spending. But I do need to be very honest with people...The global economic environment in which we’re living in is obviously volatile at the moment. I’ve got to be truthful about that.
I’ve heard people say things in the last few days that I’ve had to grit my teeth a little bit because I think it’s, I think it’s not quite accurate. I’ve heard people say ‘well, we’ve had a President [Donald] Trump before and, you know, our corporation tax rose during that time and everything was grand’ sort of thing.
True on one level but a bit flippant on another level because Trump 2024 is I think a very different situation to the first Trump presidency. Firstly, the world is different. The world is very different. The political composition, even of Europe, is different. Secondly, the mandate President Trump has received, and he has received a mandate, regardless of people’s political views, the mandate he’s received is much stronger.
And, thirdly, if it’s not too undiplomatic to say, this is a president now who knows how to use the levers of the US government. He’s no longer new to the political system. And it looks like, based on the cabinet picks that he’s choosing, and it’s his right to choose whoever he wishes to be in his cabinet, that he does seem quite determined to advance that agenda from a trade perspective.
Now I’m not all doom and gloom about this. I believe we can overcome these challenges. I think the US and the EU needed each other before the presidential election, will need each other after the presidential election. There are lots of bad actors in the world. It makes sense for the US and the EU to work together to trade.
I think trade with the EU is a good thing for people who voted for President Trump. We’ll have to be making these arguments...It looks to me like President Trump is very much assembling a team of people who will adopt a strong approach on tariffs and a protectionist approach on trade. So I mean we are heading into, all of this brings me back to the fundamental point – that we are heading into challenging economic times.
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