The Workers' Party was literally thrown into darkness at its ardfheis in Dublin on Saturday. Its afternoon session had to be abandoned after a mechanical digger working nearby accidentally cut off the hotel's electrical supply. Delegates were returning from a lunch break after a workmanlike morning session which included the keynote address from the party president, Mr Tom French.
The reaction was good-humoured, as the delegates mingled in the hotel foyer with residents having afternoon tea by candlelight. "We are a party seeking power," observed Mr French. When a delegate wondered if there were any electricians in the WP, somebody remarked that it had no shortage of bright sparks. The ardfheis, which will reconvene early next month to complete unfinished business, was a low-key affair attended by about 150 delegates;. There was a general consensus on all issues and none of the tensions that usually surfaced in the days before the split which led to the setting up of Democratic Left.
Any mention of DL touched a raw nerve, and provoked the occasional barbed comment. Ms Anne Finnegan, of the ardchomhairle, castigated the political parties in Leinster House for failing to deal with poverty and social alienation.
DL, she said, was discussing a merger with Labour, and added that Mr Pat Rabbitte, "one who always faces up to reality because otherwise he might lose out on a ministerial position or at least a seat close to the Taoiseach", had said that the ice was breaking on the Irish political scene and any serious review of the future of the left in Ireland must take place in that context.
"We in the Workers' Party are obviously very old-fashioned, backward-thinking and generally unable to face up to realities, because we do not want just to facilitate the rich to get richer. We want fundamental change where each person can live a fulfilling human life," said Ms Finnegan.
"According to the free marketeers - including Pat Rabbitte - the new millennium has no room for any such thinking. Any thinking such as ours must be put down at every turn."
Although the mood was upbeat, the party lacks the political oxygen of Dail seats. Its former president and sole TD after the split, Mr Tomas MacGiolla, who was later defeated in Dublin West, attended as a rank-and-file delegate. The party hopes some among its numbers can make it to Leinster House in the future, but it clearly will be an uphill struggle.