ANALYSIS:THE GREEN Party
has learned invaluable lessons lately on how events shape political
fortunes. Just before 8.50pm at the party conference on Saturday,
party leader John Gormley reached the section of his speech that
addressed human rights and international issues, writes
Harry McGee.
There was only one item in this section: Tibet. Gormley was aware that it would have an impact. The gist of his words had earlier been conveyed to the Chinese ambassador, Liu Biwei, who was at the conference. In anticipation of adverse reaction, Gormley toned down the prose.
What appeared in the script as "flagrant abuse" was expressed as "abuse".
This is what he said: "One country which has been exploited and suppressed and suffered for far too long is Tibet. We condemn unequivocally the abuse of human rights by the Chinese government and call on the Chinese government to enter dialogue with the Dalai Lama."
As he spoke, one of Liu's colleagues was urgently whispering a translation into his ear. The ambassador did not hesitate. The three-man Chinese delegation rose from their seats and left the hall in the full view of delegates and the wider television audience.
The Green leader - and his advisers - knew the criticisms would have an impact, but could not have predicted scale of it - neither the walk-out nor the diplomatic spat that ensued.
But an event it turned out to be. It did cause some slight discomfort for the Greens' Coalition partner, Fianna Fáil. But there was no doubt that it gave a decided boost to Gormley's standing within the party. That one paragraph had a powerful galvanising effect.
Here was Gormley saying that, notwithstanding its entry into Government, the party had not sold out on its credentials as a fearless defender of human rights. The optics of it could not have been better, both internally and to a wider audience.
To be sure, in the run-up to the conference, the Green Party had endured some of its bumpiest weeks in Government, particularly over its stance on Bertie Ahern's finances. Its formula of deflecting by expressing full confidence in the tribunal was getting harder to maintain. And the criticism was not wholly coming from outside. A motion of censure of the party's performance in Government had been tabled by the Dublin Mid-West Greens.
Those at the highest level of the party also admitted to high discomfort levels at the undermining nature of Ahern's tribunal difficulties. For example, a fortnight ago, Eamon Ryan's first big-ticket announcement - the ESB's €22 billion investment to make it the greenest utility in the world - was completely swamped by continuing media reaction to Gráinne Carruth's evidence.
But then came another fateful "event". Bertie Ahern's impromptu announcement that he was stepping down could not have come at a more opportune time.
The storm subsided. With Ahern off the pitch, the party was no longer on the back foot when defending its deal with the devil that was Fianna Fáil, to paraphrase Ciarán Cuffe's oft-repeated metaphor.
"We have always said that we would look after our political morality," said Gormley in the only reference to Ahern all weekend. Now he could say it with conviction, with a major obstacle out of the way.
The experience of Green coalitions elsewhere in Europe is that the fiercest critics invariably come from their own ranks. Party strategists knew that the Green Party would take flak over its "neutral" stance on Ahern. It made it all the more important, therefore, that the party could show that it was making its presence felt in Government.
The upshot was that its parliamentary party came well prepared. All weekend, the leadership stressed, emphasised, restressed and re-emphasised what had been achieved.
A checklist of major achievements was distributed to all delegates. It listed 38 achievements in 10 months, encompassing such diverse "gains" as emissions-based motor taxes, €26 million for wave power and "the reintroduction of the whitetailed sea eagle to Kerry".
Eamon Ryan even produced his own scorecard. And Gormley's leadership address was a prolonged defence of Green performance in Government, a complete schedule of everything that had been won in the first 10 months, from changing the mindset on climate change to getting a 43 per cent increase in budget for the Environmental Protection Agency.
What was interesting about it was the narrowness of scope - the speech was confined mainly to the environment and other Green preoccupations. There were no, or merely cursory, references to crime, health and education (though there was a decent debate on ABA education). Nor was there any mention of other thorny issues, such as the Lisbon Treaty.
As for the motion of censure? Well, it was roundly defeated yesterday. But a countermotion commending the Green Party's performance in Government was also defeated, showing that its delegates are quite capable of making up their own minds.
That said, the mood was definitely upbeat. In support of that, Gormley said yesterday that it was clear to him that Greens who were initially sceptical about going into Government had now come on board.
Perhaps party chairman Dan Boyle best articulated the state of mind of the vast majority of the delegates at this moment in time. "The Green Party is in Government and that Government is better for the Green Party being there," he said.
He could have added that the party has been lucky in the events that have come its way: the separate decisions of a Taoiseach and a Chinese ambassador to walk off the pitch.