Failure of opposition to fully capitalize on Fianna Fail's demise

turgon

The Local Elections last week marked the lowest level Fianna Fail have ever gone to since their foundation, obviously mostly due to the state of the economy. But lets be frank: they still got 25% of the vote. Now considering the way they have caused a lot of this downturn they should be a lot worse. Its pretty apparent that Fine Gael (especially) and Labour are not capitalising on this demise. True, they got lots of votes 3 weeks ago. But they werent votes for Fine Gael or for Labour. They were just votes against Fianna Fail.

The two opposition parties will probably never get a chance as good as this to come out front and yet they just aren't performing. Long term political supremacy is literally there for the taking, yet they are just seeing this opportunity slip by. Cue economic recovery, and I wouldn't be surprised if FF grew back to what it once was. This is a time to permanently damage FF but its not being done.

From a personal view this excellent single post from Sand examining how FF did in fact cause the recession has been more informative and effective for me than all the opposition campaigning combined.

Its getting to the stage where its just becoming stupid and down-heartening.

Take, for example, Enda Kenny. Now I don't base my vote on any party leader - this is a parliamentary democracy. But the fact is most people do. And Kenny has been a sorry tale of mediocrity. He has no charisma. Hes so busy moaning about the recent government decisions that Ive actually never heard him outline any of the things in Sands' post above. The tough decisions are unfortunately needed - what Fine Gael and Kenny should be doing is telling voters that the only reason this is so is because of FF incompetence. But this isnt happening. Instead they try to give the impression that tough decisions arent needed.

To be honest I lament for Irish politics. Not only do we have a god awful government, we also have a pretty bad opposition.

dave-higgz

I dunno, I doubt there's much more we could have taken from FF and to be honest I'm happy with how the opposition did. It's clear from opinion polls that there's a large core vote of FFers and thus far they haven't been swayed. There's a chance some more of them will budge after the next budget however for the most part the core vote will remain strong.

Also you must separate local FF from national FF. Most councillors didn't cause the economic crisis and therefore many of them got re-elected because of their local work, not as a protest vote. However next general election I believe we will see FF's vote under 20%! I think the hardline core vote is only around 10%, I hope! That leaves another 10% of the electorate still to be persuaded and I think to get half of them (reduce the FF vote to 15% say) would be a great achievement.

This will require massive work by the opposition though and I do question Enda's quality of leadership. He brought FG from election disaster in 2002 to having 20 extra seats in 2007. Now he's overseen the party becoming the largest in local government. The fact is that he could leave now with his head held high, but I know he won't. I think the first ginger Taoiseach is a long time coming and he's the man for the job

paddyland

The saddest part of all, is THIS:

FF, the Bertie Party, are floundering right now, wondering how in hell they can return us to the bubble. They have no idea of fiscal propriety, it's all about magically recreating the bubble. Cowen said as much. He wants us to return 'as soon as possible' to 'rapid growth.' Rapid growth = bubble.

FG share the same blinkered vision. They would like to return us to the bubble too, and hopefully enjoy the short term plaudits from the electorate of being the ones stuffing everyone's pockets with money.

Because if there really were a party in Irish politics, who not only proposed the hard measures to get us out of this, but proposed an ongoing program of fiscal rectitude and only taking out of the economy what was put in, the Irish electorate would never vote for them.

The greedy Irish electorate will vote for whoever manages to put big, brand new gas guzzling BMW mpvs in everyone's front garden every year once more..

gurramok

The opposition never shouted stop during the bubble years. They started to shout stop in 2007 onwards which was too late.

Now, we have the unusual position of an 'united' opposition which is mostly FG(cut public sector wage bill) and Labour(preserve public sector wage bill) so they are not coherent.

The public just don't realise that whoever gets into power will have to drastically cut back the public sector wage bill, cut back welfare and possibly more tax rises, there is no way out and FF would capitalise on this asking how the opposition would get us out of this mess.
The opposition won't say the real policies as they know they won't get power and thats why Irish politics is a sham.(bar George Lee of course who is direct)

Mr.Micro

gurramok wrote: »

The opposition never shouted stop during the bubble years. They started to shout stop in 2007 onwards which was too late.

Now, we have the unusual position of an 'united' opposition which is mostly FG(cut public sector wage bill) and Labour(preserve public sector wage bill) so they are not coherent.

The public just don't realise that whoever gets into power will have to drastically cut back the public sector wage bill, cut back welfare and possibly more tax rises, there is no way out and FF would capitalise on this asking how the opposition would get us out of this mess.
The opposition won't say the real policies as they know they won't get power and thats why Irish politics is a sham.(bar George Lee of course who is direct)

They were all like pigs in s**t collectively lapping up the excesses of our bloated out of control economy being fanned at national level and local level. Add in the cronyism and the property developers and the endemic corruption. There is not a lot any opposition can do if a redundant incompetent Government clings to power by the support of grubby independents like leeches that exact price and do not care about the whole country and the chameleon Green party.

Sand

To be honest - If the opposition couldnt tear strips of Bertie Ahern after the "Do you need a hug Bertie?:(" RTE interview then I wouldnt be too surprised if they dont know how to deal with Fianna Fail lying mortally wounded before them, begging for FG to do the decent thing and put them out of their misery. The only FG TD who seems to know how to throw Fianna Fail off their stride is Leo Varadkar who had the honour of visibly infuriating Bertie Ahern in the Dail (funnily enough, when Bertie is rattled he speaks clearly and to the point...).

For the argument that FG would have done little different - I agree, but I dont see the relevance. Fianna Fail have ****ed up royally. If they are not removed at the next election, why bother having elections?

My worst fear is whoever gets into power in 2012 (And it could be Fianna Fail...like a domestic abuse victim, the Irish voter probably still dreams of a return to "the good old days" of Bertie and Co) will put off the required cuts when in power to avoid angering the unions and other "interested parties".

Politicians who tackle such interests get the Mary Harney treatment - widespread hatred.

The longer and longer such cuts in the public spending is put off ( regardless of the excuses waved around, such cuts are inevitable) the more and more borrowing is required, and the greater and greater punishment of the Irish taxpayer who will not only faced reduced services ( the relationship between public pay/numbers and public service neednt be fixed on a 1 to 1 ratio to my mind) but also higher and higher taxes to service debt because whoever was in power ( Fianna Fail or Fine Gael) lacked the balls to take on the unions and make the cuts.

Even George "Messiah" Lee refuses to state the obvious - the public sector cannot be afforded.

bijapos

FF in my opinion got more than 25% if you count the independent FFers too. Dont think they will go as low as 20% in 2012. They got over 25% where I live and nobody who I spoke to voted for them or knows someone who voted for them. :rolleyes:. People do what they want in the polling station. Frustrating but thats the way it is. Main thing for FF is to stall a backbench revolt before 2012.

Greens know they are in trouble and will probably stay the distance to get as many policies as possible initiated.

If FG have any cop on, and if the government survives the next budget then they should get rid of Kenny, I agree he is uncharismatic and this affects people views. See Kinnock 1992 or Gore 2000 for this. I think if FF stay till 2012 the economy will have stabilised and they will get 60 seats or so. After that it gets interesting.

Taxipete29

[QUOTE=gurramok;60860201
Now, we have the unusual position of an 'united' opposition which is mostly FG(cut public sector wage bill) and Labour(preserve public sector wage bill) so they are not coherent.[/QUOTE]

Labour are not about preserving the public wage bill. Their proposal for economic recovery includes a proposal for the 1000 redundancies at management grade in the HSE.

nesf

gurramok wrote: »

The opposition never shouted stop during the bubble years. They started to shout stop in 2007 onwards which was too late.

Indeed. I remember the whole pension reserve fund idea being criticised by Labour (or at least one of their TDs) at the time because there were other areas they thought needed more spending.

Granted we need a change in government but the idea that the opposition were clamouring about the need to slow down and build up reserves by running large surpluses is a myth.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

bijapos

PAH!

He might be Enda "Mild-Mannered" Kenny to you by day..........

BUT AT NIGHT!!



HE IS NONE OTHER THAN................





oh is that the time.... have to go to bed

conchubhar1

what do you expect when the main opposition party is basically fianna fáil but in opposistion?

fianna (no sic) gael and labour (very very mild labour policies)


good point by donegalfella - the english political scene could teach our opposistion a few lessons

but it essentially boils down to the fact we have a 1 and a half party system - ff and fg are pretty much the same and labour are only labour in name

lostexpectation

ah yes great more desperation from ff supporters ff are so bad lets blame the opposition sheesh.

conchubhar1

no

fianna fáil are **** and so are fine gael and labour

the only difference is fg and labour havent been in govt for a while - lets see what they can do....