Fianna Fáil may have to consider ‘mergers’ if they do not find a workable message

Seán Moore’s name harks back to an almost golden era for Fianna Fáil in this affluent and socially different constituency which without exaggeration has often “belonged” to Fine Gael. Evoking Moore thus reminds us that in the 1960s and 1970s, into the early 1980s, Fianna Fáil could at times take two out of the four seats here.

Nationally, Seán Moore’s name has occurred as a backbencher who helped Charlie Haughey’s swifter-than-expected rise to power in December 1979. His serious illness following his belated appointment as government chief whip also allowed a certain Bertie Ahern begin his climb of the political greasy pole surprisingly soon after his arrival at Leinster House.

But enough of the history lessons. The story which emerged in last Friday’s by-election count is that the people who used to lay the cornerstone of Fianna Fáil’s surprise success in this atypical constituency were the working class voters in Irishtown, Ringsend and the inner city. And last week almost none of them could contemplate voting Fianna Fáil.

It gets worse. One veteran Fianna Fáil campaigner has conceded that it was a struggle to find anyone under 50 prepared to vote for the party.

Suddenly, revolt is again in the air as some people look to oust the party leader and Taoiseach Micheál Martin. The Taoiseach’s supporters are wrong when they tell us that would-be rebels could not get the necessary 10 names to activate a motion of no-confidence against the leader.

The real problem is that with an electorate of 37 TDs, they could not get the necessary 19 votes to oust Mr Martin. So, such a move would only strengthen the leader’s grip on the tiller. At all events, there are also two other simple realities. One is that Mr Martin’s leadership is not the big problem – the party’s overall lack of a message to resonate with voters is the issue. The second point is that there is no ready-made replacement for Mr Martin who could quickly lift their fortunes.

Names of would-be leaders do not have anyone dancing in the aisles. Jim O’Callaghan, in self-imposed exile on the backbenches, is a barrister with five years’ service as a TD, no government experience, and already had an uphill job to show leadership credentials. As the campaign director in a by-election which netted 5pc last week, his stock is driven even lower.

Barry Cowen has potential but his family name evokes memories of who was on the Government bridge when the economy crashed in 2008. Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien is most unlikely to be able to show progress any time soon in overcoming the housing crisis. Public Expenditure Minister Michael McGrath is well qualified, but how does he show that taking over from his Cork South Central constituency colleague is about any kind of directional change?

A big part of Fianna Fáil’s problem is that political parties are now bunched on the left – not in the centre. Covid-19 has put a bit of pep into the pace of political change in Ireland. Leo Varadkar’s Fine Gael is also making shapes to the left.

In the immediate aftermath of the last election, Fianna Fáil’s vote-share was only fractionally behind that of Sinn Féin, and a bit ahead of Fine Gael’s. But just a few months later, Fine Gael were soaring way ahead of Mr Martin’s party in opinion poll rankings.

Spool on a few months from that and suddenly Fianna Fáil were beginning to look alarmingly like the junior coalition partners. The problem most acutely manifested last week in Dublin Bay South recurs with varying degrees of gravity across the capital and other parts of the country.

Down the years, veteran Fianna Fáilers in puckish mode like to jeer the junior coalition partner, often Labour, as being “political mudguards”. The term has a particular cutting quality when it is applied to their own current situation these days. But it is being quietly used within Fianna Fáil right now.

“Is being a mudguard for Fine Gael our only future option? If it is, and things are moving quickly right now, it may be time to start thinking about a merger,” one party stalwart quietly confided to this writer in recent days.

Talk of party mergers is often exaggerated and at best premature. But finding a workable message for Fianna Fáil right now is a very hard task indeed. 

You may well think that means they’ll play for time and that further means this Coalition may yet run close to full-term.

Unless you’re in Fine Gael and think it’s time for an early cut and run. But a merger has its Fine Gael points too.