Conspiracy theories have always been popular in politics and this week saw a new, and frankly bizarre, variation on the theme. The Labour Party's general secretary, Mike Allen, is accusing Fianna Fail of mounting a campaign to rob the Labour Party of its identity as a social democratic party.
Like a lot of conspiracy theories, it has no basis in reality. Statements by David Andrews and others in Fianna Fail are confident assertions of Fianna Fail's republican tradition, no more and no less. It is a sign of the insecurity of the Labour party that these statements could be construed as anything other than this.
Perhaps "just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you" is the new Labour motto.
Being a republican party means striving to create a society where all citizens receive an equal opportunity to realise their full potential. Our aim is to create an Ireland where gender, race and creed, economic and social background are no impediment to advancement.
Mike Allen rightly acknowledges the strong support that Fianna Fail receives from ordinary workers. That is because ordinary men and women recognise Fianna Fail's commitment, not merely to creating opportunity, but to seeking to forge a society that cares for all its citizens.
No one party has a monopoly on commitment to social justice and inclusion. It is profoundly arrogant to imply otherwise. Fianna Fail and the Labour Party share certain common aims. For a time in government, both parties made good progress on these shared aims.
As such I do not recognise the caricature of Fianna Fail presented in Mike Allen's article, nor indeed is his view of Fianna Fail borne out by the facts.
The social welfare improvements in this year's Budget will cost almost £850 million in a full year compared to £215 million in the last Budget of the rainbow government in 1997 - quadrupled since this Government took office.
Social welfare recipients will get double the increase paid in 2000. These increases are explicitly designed to keep pace with increases in average earnings, not just inflation. This did not happen under the rainbow government.
Indeed in 1995, Proinsias De Rossa as minister for social welfare gave old-age pensioners a meagre increase of £1.80. This was not an accident, indeed to borrow a recent phrase from Tony Blair, this decision was a matter of "choice not chance".
Perhaps this is one of the mistakes Labour made in office that Mike Allen states "would make a social democrat shudder".
The reality is that it is Fianna Fail, and not the Labour Party, that has provided most for those in receipt of welfare and we are determined to build on our work to date.
This Fianna Fail-led government has also introduced the first national minimum wage which is set at the highest level in Europe and has raised the income of thousands of disadvantaged households.
A recent European Commission report commented favourably on the significant reduction of taxation on low-paid earners in Ireland. The report indicated that Ireland's reduction in tax on low incomes between 1997 and 1999 was more than double that of the UK.
Over our first three budgets, 176,000 people have been taken out of the tax net. As a result of Budget 2001, a record 133,000 people will be removed from the tax net.
The Labour Party is deeply sensitive regarding Fianna Fail concerns over some of its policy proposals. However, it is entirely legitimate for Fianna Fail to raise concerns over Labour proposals to raid the social insurance fund and the pension reserve fund to fund its spending plans.
It is entirely legitimate that the Minister for Health, Micheal Martin, should raise concerns about how Labour Party health proposals could adversely affect the funding of local hospitals.
What is disappointing is how the Labour Party wishes to avoid debate on these concerns by dismissing its critics as practitioners of sound-bite politics.
Mike Allen emphasises the Labour Party's links with its opposite numbers in other countries. However, it is clear that the Irish Labour party does not share the commitment to modernisation and new ideas shown by its European counterparts.
The British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, has explored the idea of staking out a new middle ground in politics which he calls the Third Way.
This means having a core concern for social justice, promoting social inclusion and having the right balance between rights and obligations. It seeks a society where state and community act in partnership and looks for a synergy between the public and private sectors with the public interest in mind.
Fianna Fail has believed in a Third Way long before such a concept was articulated. There seems to be no such appetite for new ideas in the Irish Labour party - not so much Third Way as Old Way - one of whose Dail deputies recently suggested that I was "a Blairite".
Mike Allen is quite accurate on one matter: the failure to date of the Labour Party to convince the Irish voters of the validity of its policies. However, I do not believe that the Irish people will be convinced by a mixture of well-intended but ill-considered policies and personal invective.
Instead I believe that when the general election will be held next year, voters will be asking the following three questions:
Which party has best delivered on its commitments to the Irish people?;
Which party is best able to maintain, develop and share our prosperity?;
Whom do the Irish people wish to see as their Taoiseach into the new millennium?
On all three counts I am confident that Fianna Fail has the strongest case to put to the Irish people.
Dermot Ahern is Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs