The political term shuffles wheezily toward its summer finale tomorrow.
Today there will be a slow start to another busy day at Leinster House; at least some of the parties, to the certain knowledge of top sources (as they say), had their summer drinks last night. Even the political correspondents gathered, it is understood, although that event was as refined as you would expect…
As the playbook shows below, the Government continues to push through a flurry of legislative activity - partly in response to its own deadlines, partly in answer to the constant criticisms of the “do-nothing Dail”.
But just like cramming for an exam at the end of term, the burst of industry reveals more about the indolence of the previous months than it does anything else.
Yesterday Paschal Donohoe, newly created overlord of both the Department of Finance and the Department of Public Expenditure, unveiled his Summer Economic Statement. He will debate the statement in the Dail for three hours this morning. Well, it’s one way to beat a hangover.
Our report is here. Stephen Collins warns of budget battles to come. And our editorial is here.
In truth, yesterday’s events did not tell us much that we had not already known or guessed. On the current figures, the budget will be politically unsustainable. Everyone knows it. Paschal will have to adjust his figures before October. The question is by how much.
As we write today, politics and prudence seldom make for comfortable bedfellows.
The Hangover (II)
Meanwhile, the poisonous climate of politics in the age of Trump is evident in every report from the United States.
The latest revelation, that President Trump’s son was in contact with people connected to the Russian government during the US election, has heightened the pitch of the partisan conflict between the Trump administration and its opponents in the media and the Congress.
It is a political war - the stakes could hardly be higher and it is vicious and personal. Our latest reports are here.
Political competition in this country is nowhere near as nasty. But yesterday there were flashes of a fierce and deep political conflict between Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Solidarity TD Paul Murphy at Leaders’ Questions in the Dail.
Murphy sought to raise again the Jobstown trial, in which he was acquitted, raising the question of a Garda plot to frame him, alleging perjury on the part of gardai.
There was uproar in the Dáil, and the Ceann Comhairle sought to close down Murphy’s line of inquiry. The Taoiseach, who last week admitted he was concerned at aspects of the Garda evidence in the trial, rebuffed him.
Miriam Lord casts a cold eye on the exchanges, while our report from Marie O'Halloran is here.
There was real anger in the Chamber, both ways. In truth, it has been bubbling below the surface for weeks. The mutual antipathy between the ultra-left and the parties of the governing centre has been growing.
This is not just a political difference; it is a deep cultural fissure. The parties of the ultra-left stand outside the Leinster House parliamentary consensus, its conventions and proprieties.
No doubt Leinster House is clubby, its civility contrived, its decencies often self-regarding. Maybe it is even bourgeois and decadent, as the revolutionaries would have it.
But the rule of the street is no picnic either, and history shows it is prone to monstrous demagoguery. Perhaps Leinster House could learn about the anger that the feeling of neglect by the State has engendered in some communities - the hangover from the years of austerity.
But the angry deputies of the left could pay more heed to the institutions of parliamentary democracy, too. It might not be terribly effective sometimes. But the alternative isn’t great, either.
