Flames burn brighter for Fianna Fáil at local level

In the breakthrough 1932 general election that saw Fianna Fáil enter government for the first time, Loughrea man Frank Fahy topped the poll in Co Galway.

Fahy, who later became ceann comhairle, was given a hero’s return in his native town. His biographer Michael Fahy noted he was “met by a procession, headed by torch bearers, the Leitrim and Closetoken fife and drum band, and [he was] carried shoulder-high through the streets to a platform where, amid scenes of enthusiasm, a great meeting was held ... Tar barrels blazed throughout the town and houses were illuminated”.

Galway East had quickly established itself as Fianna Fáil heartland. Fahy was at the beginning of an unbroken tradition of Fianna Fáil TDs returned there at every election since. Succeeding generations of Killileas, Kitts and Callinans occupied those seats as did the popular Noel Treacy, who died in February this year.

Even in the meltdown of the 2011 election, Michael Kitt managed to hold on. As did Anne Rabbitte in 2020, although she only had 400 votes to spare over Sinn Féin’s Louis O’Hara. With all due respect to O’Hara, many of the 7,000 people who voted for him in 2020 would not have picked him out in an identity parade. They will know him better next time around. If Sinn Féin’s poll figures remain as high, Rabbitte — despite all her achievements as Minister of State with Special Responsibility for Disability — could find herself and Fianna Fáil out in the cold in Galway East for the first time in almost a century.

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At national level, there is growing unhappiness among TDs and Senators that Fianna Fáil has not sufficiently put its stamp on this Government and no longer has a distinct identity.

Is that ennui filtering down to the local level? Is the party in decline where it was always strongest, among its grassroots and its legendary members’ network? This week we visited Galway East, and spoke to activists in Roscommon and Longford, to get their views on its identity, on its performance, and on Sinn Féin.

We begin in the pretty medieval town of Athenry. It is still bedecked with maroon and white Galway flags. A few will surely be forgotten, left to brave the elements. By winter they will be a tattered and painful reminder of the All Ireland loss. To work that flag metaphor for Fianna Fáil locally is not quite that simple. There’s been fraying surely but the flags still fly more strongly at local level than nationally.

Mary O’Keeffe is secretary of Fianna Fáil’s Comhairle Dáil Ceanntar (constituency organisation) in Galway East. A nurse by profession, she has been a party member for 30 years. She says there are about 380 signed-up cumann (branch) members in the constituency now, about half of what it was when the party was at its strongest. Covid definitely has had some impact but there is also a longer-term decline in membership.

“We are trying to build and get more members. Some people are disheartened and negative as well. There are people who are Fianna Fáil but are a bit reluctant to join and pay their subscription. It takes a lot of encouragement.”

She says party leader Micheál Martin has done a good job but there are “members on the ground who feel it’s time for him to go”.

There is an upside though. The party is attracting younger members locally, she says. That’s down to the fact that three young — and new — Fianna Fáil councillors were elected in Galway East in 2019: Shane Curley, Shelly Herterich Quinn and Albert Dolan. Each have brought new members with them, as well as a lot of new energy.

Tom Cahill, from the village of Lawrencetown, south of Ballinasloe, was national president of Ógra Fianna Fáil for two years. He says that once you have young councillors, it is a catalyst for new members. “We have two in Galway East in Albert and Shane. They attract young people in. When they go out canvassing they bring their friends and they get into the party that way.”

The future of cumann meetings is another question. “I have never met any young person who said I joined Fianna Fáil because we had two-hour meetings once a month. There’s no point bombarding people if they are busy.

“Young people don’t have an interest in that. They want to be able to discuss policy, or what they are passionate about.”

I meet Albert Dolan in Athenry. He’s 23 and the youngest public representative in the country, tall, thin and as fresh-faced as his age suggests.

What strikes you in talking to him and other activists is an absence of the doubt you hear at national level. While TDs struggle to define Fianna Fáil, Dolan gives the best working definition I’ve heard for a while. “We are a centrist party. We encourage people to do their best, to drive on. We encourage entrepreneurs. We encourage people to have a better quality of life but equally to ensure nobody is left behind.

“I like the long history, I like that Fianna Fáil goes into government when given the chance. They try to get things done. They never shy away from a challenge.”

If you want to distil what local activists think the party should be about right now, it’s housing. Just about everybody refers to its historical reputation for housing provision and also to Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien’s shared equity and Croí Cónaithe (town renewal) schemes. For the party to succeed, they say, O’Brien has to succeed. In poker parlance, Fianna Fáil is “all in” on this policy, both locally and nationally.

Elsewhere, what is evident is the dichotomy between Fianna Fáil locally and nationally; sometimes you think they could be two different parties. The party had strong local elections in 2019 taking in a big haul of council seats, including lots of young representatives. Yet, in the 2020 general election only a few months later, the party lost seats when it was expected to gain. Voters did not buy into its claims it was an agent of change.

“We have a saying up here that there’s no point in barking at the passing cars,” says Paschal Fitzmaurice, a councillor from Castlerea in Roscommon by way of explanation. What he means is that national issues sometimes have no traction locally.

“We do not deal with issues like climate change and other national issues. These are the things that infuriate people but they don’t associate them with us funnily.”

Fitzmaurice says locally people expect councillors to get things done. “The reason I joined Fianna Fáil was because I saw the way its councillors were very proactive in improving the country. It’s about having a strong work ethos. We got a serious number of people elected in 2019 on the back of it.”

After a pause, he adds: “Nationally it’s a different situation.”

Looking at it in Galway East, Cahill is of the view that the identity of Fianna Fáil is getting lost in the Coalition.

“We are not marketing ourselves as well as we could. We are doing some good things but we need to push a bit of the influence we are having in the Government.”

What’s striking is none share the sense of despair you sometimes hear nationally. For another of the new generation of Fianna Fáil representatives, Cllr Uruemu Adejinmi from Longford, the challenge revolves around communication. Again her definition closely mirrors that of Dolan.

“I do not think we have lost our identity,” says Adejinmi. “I think the party needs to work on our message maybe, communicate our successes more, show people that our focus and strengths are being centre left, progressive and pro-enterprise.”

Attracting more young people and better communications seem to be the bigger issues. Nor are there huge hang-ups about Sinn Féin.

“On the ground I don’t see much of Sinn Féin and have not met many of them,” says Dolan. “We are very strong on the ground by contrast.

“Yet I see them on Facebook and on Instagram. On social media Sinn Féin has a strong presence and support.”

The irony is the party with little local presence could take a Dáil seat; the party with a strong local presence could lose its Dáil seat. Would Dolan work with Sinn Féin? “My answer is yes,” he replies without hesitation. “I can see us working with them in the future if need be. Irish politics has become more fragmented. We will see a lot more coalitions.

“We share a lot of the same values as Sinn Féin in the sense that we want people to have a good quality of life and help working families achieve their goals.

“Where we disagree is we don’t think Sinn Féin has any interest in seeing businesses in Ireland thrive.

“I don’t share the same concern that my parents’ generation would have about Sinn Féin’s history,” he adds.

Adejinmi expresses similar sentiments: “In my opinion a coalition can be formed with any political party willing and prepared to prioritise national interest.”

To paraphrase Charles Haughey, not so much doom and gloom locally. The tar barrels have not blazed their last for Fianna Fáil in Galway East.