Analysis: Sinn Féin the real loser on water charges

An old political adage is that the expected never happens. This has been illustrated again over the past few days as Sinn Féin lost a by-election everybody expected it to win and suddenly found itself on the defensive over water charges.

It came as no surprise that the Government parties took a bit hit in the Dublin South West by-election over water charges but nobody could have foreseen even a few weeks ago that Sinn Féin would turn out to be the real loser on the issue.

Over the past three years Sinn Féin has made hay opposing the Government tooth and nail as the Coalition parties wrestled the economy back into shape by continuing the policies of the previous Government.

Now Sinn Féin has suddenly been outflanked, in Dublin South West at least, by the militant hard left Socialist Party on the issue of water charges.

Party leader Gerry Adams was forced to squirm on RTE's Morning Ireland earlier today as he tried to find a way of articulating opposition to the Government's water charges policy while declining to say that he would not pay the charges himself.

In fact a number of Sinn Féin TDs have said they will stay within the law and pay the charges while campaigning for their abolition.

Mr Adams said this morning that he would not go into government after the next election unless the water charges were reversed but he rejected a call by the newly-elected Socialist TD Paul Murphy to encourage Sinn Féin supporters to break the law and refuse to pay the charges.

The embarrassment being suffered by Sinn Féin for refusing to encourage law breaking is being enjoyed by Government TDs, particularly those on the Labour side of the Coalition who have borne the brunt of the attack from the party in working class areas.

However, the Sinn Féin predicament reflects the party’s gradual evolution from being a force that before 1997 refused to recognise the institutions of the state into one that wants to run them.

The party’s refusal to advocate law breaking on water charges is a reflection of the fact that it sees itself as a party of government in the not too distant future.

By contrast the Socialist Party has no inhibitions about encouraging law breaking on a populist issue precisely because it has no interest in being in government.

Since the early 1980s it has opposed water charges, bin charges and property tax. It gained some political foothold from time to time on the basis of its various campaigns but ultimately the bin charges and property tax became facts of life. The same will inevitably happen with the water charges.

For the moment, though, the water charges have provided the Socialist Party with an opportunity and Sinn Féin with a dilemma. How that plays out over the next 12 months will be one of the fascinating sub plots in the run up to the general election.