Coveney’s 12-month waste charge freeze a kick to touch

To govern effectively, an administration needs both will and capacity. It needs an idea of what it wants to do, and why, and it needs the ability to give force to its will.

What this Government wants to do was negotiated over an extended period with Fianna Fáil and Independent TDs, and is expressed (if somewhat windily) in the programme for government. What it actually has the ability to do is much less clear.

The biggest fact about the administration is that it cannot rely on a majority in the Dáil. Its capacity to deal with issues and controversies extends only so far as it can persuade Fianna Fáil and other parties and TDs in Opposition to back it.

This contingent capacity is again evident in the emerging response to the threat of sudden bin charge increases.

The details were still being worked out last night, but it seemed certain that the Minister responsible, Simon Coveney, will propose a 12-month freeze in charges to avoid a hike in bin charges for many consumers on July 1st.

Cajole, flatter and entice

Coveney’s talents for achieving compromises were evident during the Government negotiations, when he put in endless hours to cajole, flatter and entice the Independents into Government.

On this occasion, he needs Fianna Fáil and the waste companies to play ball – the waste companies in the 12-month freeze, and Fianna Fáil in a Dáil vote on charges tomorrow. But if they do (and the bin companies may not wish to give Coveney the time and space to cap their charges) it will be because they each judge it to be in their interests, not because they have bought into Coveney’s emollient reasonableness.

The 12-month freeze is another example of a manoeuvre at which the Government is getting a goodly deal of practice of late: the kick to touch. It is not action; rather, it is a substitute for action. But the Government lacks the capacity to act in a decisive way. What other examples?

Booted into row Z

The division over water charges between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil could have destroyed this Government before it was formed. It was booted into row Z, in the form of a temporary suspension of the charges and a commission to examine their future.

Today the Taoiseach will confirm recent indications that he will set up a citizens assembly to consider the abortion issue – taking refuge in a process which will offer him political cover for at least a year, and probably more. By the time divisive decisions on the future of the Eighth Amendment have to be made, it may well be somebody else’s problem.

Most Irish politicians are, by nature, averse to conflict; show them a way out that puts off dealing with a problem until a later date and most will take it.

Enda Kenny is nothing if not patient, and he learned from the last government that precipitous action often causes more problems than it solves.

Of course, the nature of kicking the ball into touch is that, sooner or later, somebody throws it back into play again. And sometimes the ball reappears when the players are least prepared. But that is not today’s problem.