Leinster House – and just about everywhere else – couldn’t take its eyes off Donald Trump for a minute this week, as the no-seat-belts rollercoaster that is global politics in 2025 continued its wild ride.
Other things were happening too, though. Look away momentarily from Trumpology, and this week saw two reveals about the state of Irish politics – and a signpost to the future.
First, the reveals. When the HSE published its plan for capital spending on Wednesday, TDs of all parties scrambled to see what it contained for their constituencies. A scan of local media shows how it works at a retail politics level: on Midwest Radio, there was a Minister of State, Alan Dillon, welcoming 75 new beds at Ballina District Hospital and 50 at Belmullet District Hospital; across the country in Louth, Fine Gael TD Paula Butterly on LMFM was welcoming €3.5 million for projects at Our Lady of Lourdes hospital in Drogheda. (It was noticeable, by the way, how quickly Fine Gael TDs were on to the announcements – no doubt they will be grateful to Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill for the heads-up.)
Another Government-supporting TD was also on the case. Dublin Bay North Independent Barry Heneghan issued a press release welcoming the investment in his constituency. In it he quoted his predecessor, patron, adviser and all-round moustachioed inspiration, Finian McGrath, who trumpeted the “HENEGHAN DEAL” (Trumpian all-caps included) which is “coming to fruition” before our very eyes.
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That would be one of the deals with the Independents for constituency projects that the Government has repeatedly said don’t exist, in return for their support of the Government. When this was put to him, Heneghan said: “I’m not supporting [the Government] for the craic.”
Give this young TD full marks for honesty.
The second reveal of the week was the brazen wheeze by the Social Democrats in redesignating the suspended Eoin Hayes as a party TD. The Social Democrats made a great show of chucking out Hayes when it emerged that he misled the party about shares he previously held in a former employer, which happened to be doing work for the Israel Defense Forces.
[ When is a Soc Dem TD not a Soc Dem TD?Opens in new window ]
Hayes was suspended “indefinitely”, shunned by his former colleagues and listed by the Oireachtas as an Independent member. Until, that is, the Social Democrats realised that if they counted him as one of their TDs, they would be entitled to two committee chairs rather than just one.
Cue a swift reverse-ferret. Acting leader Cian O’Callaghan insisted to the Ceann Comhairle that “there remain 11 Social Democrat TDs in our party”. As Fianna Fáil’s Malcolm Byrne quipped, “So you can be a member of the Soc Dems and not a member of the Soc Dems at the same time”. The still-suspended Hayes will, alas, not be considered for actual membership of a committee, the party confirmed.
For all the party’s lofty declarations of a new type of politics, the Social Democrats are just as likely to pull a political stroke as anyone else in Leinster House.
And the signpost to the future? On Wednesday morning in Buswells Hotel, Opposition parties gathered under the banner of the Irish Neutrality League. There were speakers from Sinn Féin, the Social Democrats, People Before Profit and Independents in both Houses. Labour sent apologies. In other words, almost the entire Dáil opposition, and a goodly chunk of the Seanad, are on board.
Their mission? To stop the forthcoming Bill to abolish the triple lock, which the group believes to be a threat to Irish neutrality. I expect there will be big campaigns, inside and outside the Dáil, on this. It will be one of the defining Government-versus-Opposition rows of the year. And unlike the speaking rights row, it will actually matter.
It would not be unfair to point out that many of the speakers above have been warning for years that neutrality is on its last legs, threatened by the US army’s use of Shannon, the Nice treaty, The Lisbon treaty, Pesco, Nato’s Partnership for Peace and so on. It would also not be unfair to point out that during many of these debates, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael pointed to the triple lock as a guarantor of our neutrality.
This is not an esoteric debate. The Government has previously flagged its intention to join the “coalition of the willing” to assist Ukraine in the event of a peace deal – a commitment that would involve sending Irish peacekeepers. Minister of State Emer Higgins attended a meeting about the plans – described by the UK government as “real and substantial ... well-developed” – at Nato headquarters in Brussels on Thursday. She was there, the department said, in an “observer capacity”. As they say: this is happening, people.
The Government will probably push the legislation when the mission is in prospect so that the debate centres on a tangible example of deploying troops in Ukraine rather than on the abstract concept of neutrality. But Micheál Martin is said to be impatient to get moving.
As indeed he is on many things – something remarked on by some of the secretaries general of all government departments assembled this week by the Taoiseach to hear his thoughts. “Urgency” and “delivery” were the themes the mandarins heard most often.
Back in the Taoiseach’s office, Martin has been approaching political scraps with some relish of late. Well, if he is impatient for a fight, he will certainly get one on the triple lock.
