Not a lot of action one year into government

It’s a year since the Government was formed – and in that time, we have seen more action on the streets of Ahascragh that we have around Leinster House, because things have just rumbled along in a perennial holding pattern.

Sure – there have been controversies involving the Gardai and religious orders (especially around the Tuam babies controversy) but they would have happened independently of government.

So the question is – what has the Government driven in the past year? And the answer to that is very little of its own volition.

Massive external events have determined the direction of politics here - namely the Brexit referendum and the election of one Donald John Trump US president. But the point is that the Government action has been reactive to those events rather than proactive.

We all know the reasons for that. Fine Gael has 50 seats. That’s 28 seats short of a majority. With the Independent Alliance votes, plus Katherine Zappone and plus Denis Naughten, that’s 57. They can also rely on Independents Michael Lowry and (sometimes) Michael Harty from Clare.

But the reality is for the really critical votes, they rely on Fianna Fáil to either support them, or to abstain. The kernel of the main opposition party’s approach to this issue is found in a three-page confidence and supply document that pledges support for an agreed Budget, for votes of confidence in the Government and on several other matters.

When it comes to the national interest they have voted together, not least when the European Commission ruled that Apple should pay the State €13 billion in back taxes. Naturally, both voted against.

The recent debacle over water charges shows why so little has been happening. Because the composition of the Oireachtas is looking like a patchwork quilt, it’s very hard to get clean lines on anything. What happened with water charges was a great example of it.

It showed why new politics, the politics of deep compromise, just doesn’t work so well in Ireland. The water charging concept was essentially killed by committee.

Fianna Fáil decided it would go with the populist view that water charges were wrong. And it essentially forced Fine Gael to abandon any hope of charging households for water. There was a row at the end where Simon Coveney clawed back some territory and got one over Barry Cowen.

For more, read this week's Connacht Tribune.