IQ: Could Fianna Fáil’s internal tensions spread?

Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin once again finds himself fighting the enemy within. A year out from a general election, with his party competing against the biggest government majority in the history of the State and an upbeat Sinn Féin, opinion polls stubbornly refuse to move in the right direction for Fianna Fáil.

Some level of unrest was inevitable after the party recorded its lowest Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI rating in almost three years, 17 per cent, and was "becalmed" in other polls.

Step forward long-time rebel John McGuinness, a frequent critic of the party leadership’s strategy, and Martin’s unpredictable former deputy leader Eamon Ó Cuív, who said the lack of progress was “breaking his heart”.

There is genuine unhappiness from both McGuinness and Ó Cuív at the direction the party is going in. But Martin loyalists despair of their habit of washing Fianna Fáil’s dirty linen in public and describe their outbursts as destructive.

End of his tether

Martin reached the end of his tether this week and told a private party meeting many TDs were doing a better job of undermining Fianna Fáil than their political opponents in

Fine Gael

,

Labour

or Sinn Féin.

The party’s discipline problem pre-dates the Martin era and was manageable when the party was a behemoth. Now that Fianna Fáil is more of a minnow an inability to put on a show of unity is much more damaging. None of this is good for the morale of younger party representatives who complain they struggle to get media coverage of the policy documents they have worked hard to produce.

Took aim

An exasperated

Niall Collins

, the party’s justice spokesman, took aim at McGuinness when an event launching a Bill to crack down on public disorder in Dublin was dominated by questions about internal party tensions.

“John McGuinness needs to just put his shoulder to the wheel. It’s not always about John McGuinness. It’s about Fianna Fáil,” Collins said.

A byelection is looming and former Fianna Fáil TD Bobby Aylward is in with a chance of taking a seat in Carlow-Kilkenny on May 22nd. But if Fianna Fáil fails in the constituency it will mark the seventh byelection the largest Opposition party will have lost under Martin’s leadership.

Grumblings about his leadership could spread in that event.

In truth, Fianna Fáil had quite a good week. Finance spokesman Michael McGrath set the agenda on mortgages, and both Martin and Billy Kelleher were strong on the Dunnes Stores issue.

But while the party’s good local election result and large membership base should be acknowledged, repeatedly poor national opinion poll ratings cannot be ignored and usually have consequences.

But the key question is: who in the parliamentary party would have the calibre to take over from the experienced Martin?