EU Referendum

Showing posts with label Ireland. Show all posts

I am shocked, I tell you, shocked. I hear from Anthony Coughlan of The National Platform that the European Commission has, in defiance of European legislation, which makes the ratification of a treaty a purely national matter, intervened in the Irish campaign.

This Sunday there was a

16-page propaganda Supplement on the EU being inserted in every Irish Sunday newspaper today. This must have cost several million euros - using European and Irish taxpayers' money to influence Irish voters to ratify the Lisbon Treaty and in the process expand the power and functions of the Brussels Commission itself.

Who could have believed that the Commission would act so cynically?

Presumably, the argument is that they are merely spreading information and not interfering in Irish domestic politics while telling tales of porcine aviation.

It would appear (more shocks to the system) that the information is not entirely accurate. Jens Peter Bonde has fisked the document.

COMMENT THREAD

Irish_No+03[i-Irish_No+03]We have received an e-mail from Dr Anthony Coughlan of The National Platform in Ireland, whom we have mentioned once or twice before on this blog. (Well, a few more times than that.) Dr Coughlan thinks the battle for Ireland, a.k.a. the second Irish Referendum, scheduled for October 2, can be won and suggests some ways in which supporters from other countries can help:

So anything that you can do in or from your own country to show soldiarity with the Irish No-side over the five weeks to our referendum and to bring home to voters here that Ireland would not be isolated or "punished" if they dare to vote No to Lisbon again, could be very helpful to us in our democratic struggle.

Such actions could take the form, for example, of delegations to Irish Embassies abroad to hand in letters congratulating Ireland for being the only EU country whose people are being allowed to vote on the "Lisbon Constitution" ... Or demonstrations outside the EU Commission offices in your country, protesting at the Commission's outrageous and unlawful interference in the Irish referendum campaign, something that has been sanctioned by Commission President J M Barroso and his Secretary-General, the Irishwoman Catherine Day.

Any such actions would of course need to be brought to the attention of the Irish media, so far as possible, if voters in Ireland are to be made aware of them. Details of the Irish media can be got on http://www.medialive.ie.

Or people outside Ireland could send letters in English to the Irish national and provincial newspapers making various points about the Lisbon Treaty, showing thereby that people in other EU countries are against the Treaty too. Or they could write privately to friends and acquaintances they may have in Ireland, or to Irish people at addresses taken from our phone book. Or use the internet, blogs and e-mail, especially social networking sites, to send messages to people here.

Or if people had the resources, they might consider putting advertisements in the Irish newspapers. These should not of course entail "telling" Irish people how to vote, or be hectoring or patronising in any way. They should rather make factual points about the Treaty, point out that people elsewhere in Europe are being denied a chance to vote on it, that Ireland would not be isolated if it votes No again, and appealing to Irish voters to "bear us in mind" when they vote on 2 October.

And friends outside Ireland will be able to think of other ways to show their concern and solidarity.

We get many, largely justified, complaints that there is nothing any of us can do. Well, here are many ideas of things people can do to further the cause. Go, go, go!

COMMENT THREAD

Brian Cowen, the Taoiseach has told the Dáil that the second Irish referendum will take place on October 2. Propaganda, masquerading as misleading information has already begun or, rather, it never stopped.

RTÉ News informs us that

The campaign was marked by a complex No campaign which raised some issues that did not form part of the Treaty.

Following that vote, the Government put in train an analysis of the reasons the document was voted down.

Arising from that research, pressure was put on the other EU members to accommodate Irish voters' concerns, in order to allow for a second vote with a better chance of success.

A two-day EU summit last month agreed to legally binding guarantees on the application of the Treaty in Ireland.

I'd say every single one of those statements is economical with the truth, especially that notion of legally binding guarantees. Even officially they do not become legally binding until the next treaty, whenever that might happen.

The BBC, not to be outdone in the economical with the truth stakes, also tells us about those guarantees, adding for good measure that the Lisbon Treaty was "aimed at streamlining EU institutions". I suppose abolition of parliamentary democracy does streamline institutions.

If the Irish vote no, presumably the colleagues will go through another exercise of having a dialogue with the people, possibly led by someone other than the Fluffy Commissar. Then they will have another IGC (or two or three, on past showing) and come up with another treaty. This time they might not let the Irish vote on it either.

If the Irish vote yes then it is up to President Klaus to hold his pen firmly above the paper and not sign the treaty. (There is also the question of what kind of legislation will be required in Germany.) If the Conservatives are serious about their opposition to the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty (stop sniggering at the back), they will follow our advice and ask President Klaus to hold that pen aloft, in order to give Britain a chance to vote in that referendum that will surely happen under a Conservative government.

Anthony_Coughlan[i-Anthony_Coughlan]Yesterday evening Dr Anthony Coughlan a long-term campaigner in Ireland, the man who is responsible for the fact that referendums are called in that country before treaties are ratified and also for the fact that two of them, Nice and Lisbon, were given a NO before the Irish were forced to vote again, gave a talk to the Bruges Group about the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty and the situation in Ireland.

Afterwards I managed to sit down and have a long chat on what we can do to help on this side of the Irish Sea. It is very limited because there is legislation about funding from abroad during electoral and referendum campaigns. Naturally, this does not apply to the EU or the Commission as they do not campaign, merely produce information (mostly descriptions of feats of flying by the Porcine Air Force).

Nor would it be a good idea to have speakers from Britain, which rather upset me as I was looking forward to a possible visit to Dublin, a city I love dearly. The Irish government, astonishingly enough, plays the nationalist card while campaigning for the final destruction of the Irish Free State.

However, if the NO campaign provides information that is rather a different affair. Their aim is to publish a newsprint version of the annotated Consolidated Treaties, showing how the Lisbon Treaty changes the existing situation. It is complete with a detailed glossary and index and would be an excellent weapon in the fight if it went out to every household with a neutral letter that called attention to the need to understand what people are voting about.

The other issue is President Klaus's pen, which is, at present in the air as he stubbornly refuses to sign the treaty's ratification in the Czech Republic. He can, in fact, keep that pen in the air indefinitely but if the Irish vote YES in October the pressure on him to sign will be huge.

His office has been hinting heavily that it would be easier for him to resist that pressure if he could say that he had had numerous letters and requests from Britain, particularly from the British Conservatives, asking him to hold back the signature until the General Election after which the latter are likely to form the new government with the intention of giving the British people the referendum that they had been denied previously.

To be fair to President Klaus, he sounds rather doubtful about the Conservatives and their intentions in connection with the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty. But it is possible that he could use letters from British MEPs, MPs and peers as well as various organizations to bolster his own argument for not signing. A letter from the Shadow Foreign Secretary, of course, would be ideal. But that would presuppose that the Shadow Foreign Secretary actually cared one way or another about the subject.

COMMENT THREAD

link[i-link]The Independent reports that Declan Ganley, the would-be saviour of Europe, has quit politics. Mr Ganley had asked for a recount in the horribly complicated Irish voting system because he thought that some of his votes had been allotted to another candidate. It turned out to be the other way round and the votes, allotted properly put Mr Ganley 13,000 behind the front three runners in the North West euro constituency. (That is, clearly, not the same as the North West euro constituency in England.)

Mr Ganley has rather grandly announced that Libertas was not about him and his return to the private sector will not affect the campaign in the second Irish referendum one bit.

On the whole, this can be described as utter tosh. Mr Ganley made quite sure that much of the campaign was about him. Even if that were not true, his behaviour has done great damage to the cause, damage that it may not recover from.

As readers of this blog know, we were sceptical of Mr Ganley and Libertas.eu both for personal and political reasons. Mr Ganley and the Former British Soldier, Robin Matthews, who led the UK campaign, did little to endear themselves to people who were interested in their activity. (As I said before, I do not take kindly to people who patronize me, unless it happens to be the boss.)

Their political ideas were muddled, (and here) to put it mildly. The idea that there could be some sort of a reform of the European Union through the Toy Parliament, no matter who is elected is laughable in its ignorance of the structure of the political entity they were haughtily explaining to others. (Haughtily but rather vaguely.)

Added to that was the incoherent campaigning that consisted of appeals to eurosceptic groups interspersed with assertions that Libertas.eu was definitely Europhile, as, indeed, it was.

I lost track of the number of press releases I was sent, all of which attacked UKIP. When I asked for a reason, I was told that they were anxious to make sure that UKIP did not benefit from the expenses scandals and, therefore, they had to keep reminding people of such dubious characters as Tom Wise.

This would be logical if people voted solely on the basis of what they thought about the expenses scandal. But that was not so. The fact that UKIP came second, the vote for the various eurosceptic parties added up to a sizeable chunk and the BNP got two seats in the Toy Parliament would indicate that there was a great deal more on people's minds. That is why neither Libertas.eu nor Jury Team did particularly well. It was not simply an anti-politician vote, though there was an element of that.

Finally, there was Libertas's unfortunate tendency to be less than completely transparent in its descriptions of its activity.

For those or other reasons Libertas.eu did as badly as we expected in Britain and 25 other member states. Perhaps a little worse than we expected in Poland. What was rather shocking is how badly the party did in Ireland where the only other one to oppose the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty was Sinn Fein. Did the Irish really vote on domestic issues only or did they feel they had had enough of Mr Ganley and his merry men (and women)?

The answer can come only from someone who is better acquainted with the situation in that country. However, it seems to us obvious that Mr Ganley made a monumental mistake when he allowed his vanity to lead him into trying to form a pan-European party.

Flushed with the triumph of the No vote in the first Irish referendum he ought to have sat back and said that he was interested only in stopping the treaty. This could not be done in the Toy Parliament (a point that escaped Mr Ganley, I suspect) and, therefore, Libertas was not going to get involved in those elections but wait for the second referendum and campaign there.

At most, he should have campaigned only in Ireland, making that into a back-up referendum. He and his colleagues might have done quite well.

Instead, Mr Ganley decided to promote himself and his followers into a band of brothers dedicated to the salvation and reform of the European project. They failed miserably and deservedly. In the process, though, they destroyed Libertas's political credibility in Ireland and damaged, very severely, the chances of a No vote in October when the second referendum is likely to take place. (Smart money is on October 10 but no decision can be taken until the Referendum Bill is passed by the Dail in July.)

The battle in Ireland will be a tough one, made much tougher by Declan Ganley's recent antics and failure. We, in this country, must do all we can to help. This blog is standing by.

COMMENT THREAD

A bit of a slow news day for the time being - although matters are looking a little grim in Georgia - so it might be time to catch up on the latest developments (or otherwise) to do with the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty.

To absolutely nobody's surprise the Irish Minister for European Affairs, Dick Roche, has announced that the second Irish referendum will be held in the autumn.

He added that as part of the process of steering its way out of recession Ireland needed to secure its position within the European Union.

Speaking in Berlin to the German Council on Foreign Relations, the Minister said he wanted to deliver the message that Ireland was coming to grips with its problems and taking decisive action to bring the Government's finances under control, ensure the health of the banking system and improve competitiveness.

He remained a little vague on how exactly the treaty will improve Ireland's economic position but, perhaps, vagueness is all that one can offer at this stage.

Over on ToryBoy blog Jonathan Isaby, correctly in our opinion, is predicting a possible unwelcome headache for David Cameron as a result of the Irish referendum. Then again, the probability of an autumn vote has been very high for some time. David Cameron et al should have been prepared and the words "we shall not let matters rest there" are not exactly an indication of preparedness.

The Czech Senate will be voting on the treaty tomorrow (Wednesday, May 6) and it looks like it will pass, though there will remain the question of the presidential signature. President Klaus has, so far, insisted that he would wait for the second Irish result. Poland's President still has not signed it and Germany has not ratified either [scroll down to second question].

COMMENT THREAD

CelticCat[i-CelticCat]Anthony Coughlin of The National Platform that has been fighting the good fight in Ireland since long before Libertas was even a gleam in Declan Ganley's eye has sent me an article about Ireland that appeared in the New York Times. None of them seem all that impressed by the Celtic Tiger and its ability to go on thriving in the new economic situation.

Paul Krugman, who has won the Nobel Prize for Economics (which is not really a Nobel Prize exactly but let that pass) and, therefore, is to be taken with a large dose of salt, thinks that Ireland has got into the mess it is in by opening itself to the great free market and the government is now making matters worse by "is being forced to raise taxes and slash government spending in the face of an economic slump — policies that will further deepen the slump".

He is worried that America might go the same way.

A somewhat different point of view comes from the Mises Institute. Under the delightful title of "The Celtic Kitten", John Engle explains that Ireland's problems stem largely from excessive government intervention. Mind you, I don't know where he gets the idea that it is something new. So far as I can make out the Irish government has always had controlling interest in "public transport, electricity generation and transmission, and broadcasting media (radio and television)".

What of the EU subsidies that under-wrote a good deal of that much admired economic growth? What part did that play?

COMMENT THREAD

Declan_Ganley[i-Declan_Ganley]It takes a really arrogant man to describe himself as being naive, adding immediately that being naive, if you are also ambitious, may not be the worst thing. Sometimes you just have to take your lance, charge downhill and to hell with the consequences.

There was much more sub-military language in Declan Ganley's address to the Henry Jackson Society last Tuesday and in the subsequent discussion; much talk of holding the line, leaving the trenches, the Irish people ("not me, it was the people") being the advance guard that needs the support of the rest of the people of Europe. [And yes, I know, I should have written about it before but other matters intervened.]

In parenthesis it should be noted that as far as Declan Ganley is concerned there is no difference between the EU and Europe and democracy means asking the people of Europe, whatever that might be, though he did acknowledge that there is no pan-European politics as yet. I shall return to this extraordinary muddle in thinking.

Several minutes went on a fiery announcement that he, Declan Ganley, was prepared to make any sacrifice to achieve his aim of restoring [sic] democracy to the European project. There is nothing more "they" can do to him. In fact, "they" have not done much to him anyway, except for calling him names. Big deal! Some of us have had to put with that for some time, on occasion losing jobs for not toeing the line. Hardly great sacrifices, particularly as some of the shocking names he was called were "eurosceptic" and "anti-European". As risk and sacrifice go, facing up to those words does not come very high on my list.

Of course, said Mr Ganley, almost succeeding in looking modest, other people have made far greater sacrifices for democracy. Nevertheless, he managed to draw an implicit parallel between himself and an (unnamed) commander of the Continental Army at Yorktown (not, I presume, Washington) who ordered a devastating artillery fire at his own home, suspecting that General Cornwallis had made it his headquarters.

What there was a shortage of in the talk and subsequent discussion is coherence in Libertas's stance. Just what is it Mr Ganley (oops, sorry he did say call him Declan because Mr Ganley is his father) wants to achieve? I managed to ask two questions, introducing myself as being from EUReferendum, clearly an unfamiliar name to Mr Ganley Declan. Congratulating him on his readiness to make any sacrifice for the cause I wondered whether it might not be wasted.

Even if the Lisbon Treaty fails and even if Libertas gains a large number of seats in the Toy European Parliament, almost all that he dislikes about the EU - lack of accountability, European legislation trumping national, European citizenship - would still be in place. Indeed, they are integral parts of the European project, which Mr Ganley Declan, according to his own repeated comments, supports.

Is he suggesting that the Consolidated Treaties should be torn up and a completely new structure created?

No, of course, not. Mr Ganley Declan is not, he assured us, a revolutionary (though he is ambitious and ready to take risks). The revolutionaries are those who sit in Brussels and create a system that takes power away from the people.

Though that statement had the air of being thought of at the last minute, it is closer to the truth than Mr Ganley Declan suspects - the European project is a revolutionary one. The problem is that it is more coherent than Libertas who seems to have no other spokespersons, gives it credit. To say, as Mr Ganley Declan did, that the problem is the Lisbon Treaty and there is no need for it because we still have the Nice Treaty and then to talk about the need for democracy is to exhibit a terrifying lack of knowledge.

However, he did explain that his main aim in getting himself and others of his ilk into the European Parliament is to ensure that people like me had a voice because at present we have none. They are not listening to people like me. They are not exactly listening to people like him, either, but Mr Ganley Declan obviously has a slight touch of the Obama about him. No, they are not listening and they are not democratic but once he is in the European Parliament, all will change because he is not prepared just to sit there and let business as usual carry on.

I did not bother to ask him what he was going to do about it in the Toy European Parliament because it was quite clear that he saw himself as considerably more savvy and knowledgeable about the EU (despite all evidence to the contrary). In fact, I was waiting for him to tell me not to bother my little head about it because he will ensure that my voice will be heard.

My other question was about the European President, something Mr Ganley Declan finds abhorrent, particularly as the people of Europe have not been asked whether they want one. The people of Britain, he proclaimed in ringing tones, should have a choice in this matter; they should be asked whether they want a European President.

Very well, said I, suppose the people of Britain are asked and vote against the idea; but suppose across Europe the people of it vote in favour; we shall get a European President whether we like it or not. I am sorry to say that Mr Ganley Declan did not answer the question, possibly because he was too busy assuring everyone that he was not a withdrawalist, not a revolutionary and not a eurosceptic. In fact, he wanted to save the European project because if it carries on the way it is going, there will be serious calls in many countries for withdrawal and that would be a tragedy.

This was one of the themes of his talk. The European project, in his opinion has come a long way and must not be undermined by those in Brussels who want to put an anti-democratic spin on it; who are shocked by the fact that people, who ought to be the owners of this project, do not want to march in lockstep with them. If they are allowed to go their own way, the withdrawalists will become strong and the project will disintegrate.

The problem with that is, as all our readers will instantly realize, that the project never had a democratic aspect to it. Clearly Mr Ganley Declan has never read a certain book that the boss and his colleague, Christopher Booker, wrote, in which they clearly explain the anti-democratic nature of the project from the very beginning.

Now, this would not matter if one said openly that democracy is a so-so idea, a recent and not very successful experiment and, maybe, it is best to move on. But that is not what Mr Ganley Declan is saying. He sees himself as the man whose appointed role it is to restore democracy to "Europe" or the European project.

We do not need the Lisbon Treaty, which has all those undemocratic and even anti-democratic ideas in it; we already have the Nice Treaty and can go back to it. Presumably, he has not read the Nice Treaty either and has forgotten that the Irish voters tried rejecting it once but were bullied and cheated into voting it through. Hardly the behaviour of a democracy. No wonder he did not answer my question about the European President.

Furthermore, Mr Ganley Declan keeps talking about the people of Europe and the need for them to have their democratic rights restored and to speak up about the way these are being stolen from them. Those who are doing the stealing, we were told several times, are using the well-tried method of "divide and conquer". They ask the people of individual member states and discard those results if they are not the ones the eurocrats want to hear. Now, if only the people of Europe united and stood up to these dastardly tactics …

Well, what? It seems Mr Ganley Declan does not understand exactly what he is saying. At best he believes in a perestroika: if we change things a little bit here and there the whole project will miraculously become what we always wanted it to be. Except that it was not clear to me or to a number of people in the audience what the aim of the exercise is – just what is it Mr Ganley Declan wants to achieve beyond getting a group of like-minded and woolly-minded individuals into the Toy European Parliament.

He was also very coy about his plans in the UK and one cannot help feeling that he is leaving the putting together of his pan-European list of candidates (the only one, as he proudly explained) very late. Those elections are in June.

COMMENT THREAD

This morning, like a number of people, I received an e-mail from my good friend Antony Coughlan, one of the leading lights of the Irish eurosceptic movement. It consisted of the text of an article in the Irish Daily Mail, whose journalists have found something quite interesting:

The Government has hatched an elaborate plan to deceive voters over the forthcoming EU treaty referendum, the Irish Daily Mail can today reveal. A leaked email shows that ministers are planning a deliberate campaign of misinformation to ensure that the Lisbon Treaty vote is passed when it is put to the public as required by the Constitution.

Foreign Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern has even been personally assured that the European Commission will "tone down or delay"’ any announcements from Brussels "that might be unhelpful".

Oh dear. I am not going to make that comment again about being shocked, shocked, shocked. Still it is good to know that these people run true to form. Can't say I am proud of our government's behaviour but then one rarely is proud of one's government.

Here is a link to the whole article and a discussion of it. Enjoy, if that is the right word.

According to the Irish Times the referendum in the one and only EU member state that will be allowed to have a say on the Constitutional Reform Lisbon Treaty, Ireland, will be on June 12. As one has to subscribe to the Irish Times, the story can be read on EUObserver.

Prime Minister Bertie Ahern told parliament on Tuesday (11 March): "The government have more or less signed off on the date. It is really a question about the day of the week.

We are looking at the second week of June."

According to the Irish Times, the date will probably be Thursday, 12 June.

As this blog has pointed out, Bertie Ahern, the possible first President, has already started campaigning, with concentration on the need to combat global warming climate change. Oh for a Canute to show him and his megalomaniac colleagues the sheer stupidity of their comments.

Of course, it does not take too many brains, though more than the average politician and most of our journalists possess, to find out that far from global warming we may well be entering a period of global cooling. At any rate this year and the last two have been considerably colder than the ones before. Yes, yes, I know that's weather and not climate but that did not stop the hysterics about Britain becoming a drought-ridden desert after two moderately dry years.

Back to what matters. Not only do we wish our Irish friends and colleagues well but we intend to do everything in our power to further their cause.

Celtic+tiger[i-Celtic+tiger]Ireland, we have been told on numerous occasions, is an example to us all with its economy, fuelled by lower taxation, particularly corporation tax, roaring ahead. A Celtic tiger. Sadly, one must admit that the Celtic tiger has been fed by lettuce, our lettuce in the form of various funds handed over by the European Union.

While there is very good evidence that lower taxation fuels economy and brings in a better income to the state, should that be needed, Ireland has not been a particularly good example of the Laffer Curve, precisely because her government did not have to get its income entirely from taxation of one form or another. There was always the EU subsidy (let’s call it by its proper name), which meant, in turn, that no hard political decisions had to be taken.

In his article “Minding the Celtic Tiger”, AEI researcher Jurgen Reinhoudt does not, for once, shirk the issue.

Some Europeans, particularly European Union officials in Brussels, praise significant EU structural subsidies—in the tens of billions—for planting the seeds of Irish prosperity. It is certainly true that many of the EU structural funds Ireland received were invested in economically sound infrastructure projects, technological research and development, and education. For the most part, such funds contributed to economic growth.

But EU structural funds alone would not have helped Ireland escape its economic predicament. Many nations receive outside financial aid without any appreciable increase in their economic prosperity. The real credit belongs to Irish fiscal policy. Beginning in the late 1980s, successive Irish governments pursued vital spending cuts and tax relief.

Let me just add that it is not only European Union officials who draw attention to those structural subsidies (not to mention the agricultural ones) but a number of other people, which just goes to show that eurosceptics and those officials frequently agree in their aims and ideas. We both want to make sure that people know about the EU’s role.

It is true that subsidies, by themselves, do not a growing economy make. Just look at some of the other recipients of EU funding. The names Spain and Greece spring to mind. But neither are they irrelevant. The government may make the right decision of what to do with the moneys and where to go from there but, in fact, the Irish government did not have to pursue spending cuts as much as all that. The structural (and agricultural) funds took care of any real problem.

However, there is no question that those tax cuts and the low(ish) rate of corporate tax contributed greatly to the economic growth and it might not be a bad idea for politicians in some other countries to take note of that. Too many international firms went to Ireland instead of coming to Britain and who can blame them.

However, Mr Reinhoudt sees problems ahead:

Of course, with economic success come the perils of affluence. Irish real-estate prices have skyrocketed, and increased immigration has brought new challenges to a country long accustomed to mass emigration and “brain drain.” Brisk employment growth has led to a tight labor market, in which professionals can be hard to come by. Compared to what Ireland dealt with in the 1980s, however, these problems seem like small beer.

The real question is, Will Ireland stay with the formula that has made it so successful, or will it become complacent in its prosperity? A slight economic slowdown, caused by the subprime-lending crisis, is expected in 2008, with growth now projected at 3.5 percent compared to earlier estimates of 5 percent. But if Ireland’s housing market does not enjoy a soft landing, the slowdown could come much sooner and be far more severe.

How Irish politicians respond will tell us a great deal about the future prospects of the Irish economy. Will they attempt to tax their way out of it, or will they stick with the model that has made Ireland the envy of many Western European nations? We will soon find out.

Furthermore, there is the problem of those subsidies. With all those East European and semi-Balkan countries to support, Ireland is not likely to go on getting her usual share indefinitely. What will happen then? I remember a joke Garrett Fitzgerald once made about Ireland becoming so successful that it might become a net donor and the Irish then all becoming eurosceptic. Truth is often spoken in jest.

COMMENT THREAD

Bertie+Ahern[i-Bertie+Ahern]The Teflon Taoiseach is back with a third victory. Well, almost. Fianna Fail has 78 of the 166 seats and a coalition government will be formed after a certain amount of tough negotiation. Whether it will be any more stable than other coalition governments remains to be seen.

The results are interesting. Fine Gael has 51 seats, 18 up; the Labour Party has 20 and the Greens managed only 6, which is not altogether surprising in an election that was all about the economy. Sinn Fein has dropped from 5 to 4 seats, losing Dublin Central; the Progressive Democrats, the most likely partner in the coalition is down to 2 seats; and there are a few independents.

Fianna Fail’s victory has rather surprised the media and various commentators. Inevitably, one has to wonder whether there are any signs here for Britain.

At first sight, no. Irish politics is so different from British that no lessons could possibly be drawn. A similar turn to the two main parties would leave all others so far out in the cold that they would be forgotten till the next election.

In today’s Daily Telegraph, Dean Godson, whose knowledge of Irish and Ulster politics is among the best, says otherwise He thinks that there are certain lessons for British politicians to be drawn and they may not be the ones the Boy-King wants to hear as he enmires himself deeper and deeper in the schools row of his own making.

Some of Mr Godson’s points I am in agreement with. Others not so much. For instance he calls both hospitals and green issues “quality of life” ones. I know nothing about his private life but for most people medical care is of essence in life. So, if there were arguments about Irish hospitals they were presumably not as strong or as bitter as those in Britain.

Education, according to Mr Godson is not a “quality of life” but an economic issue, of huge significance to the aspiring middle class of Ireland. Can that be translated to the British situation? I think so, but I do not see which party could possibly garner support there.

Green issues, on the other hand, are usually “also rans” for most people unless the economy happens to be doing extraordinarily well. One has to assume that some of Mr Ahern’s popularity must rest on the fact that he has presided over the Irish growth, which is now spluttering a bit. Nevertheless, the voters might feel that the man could carry on as he did before.

Certainly, the alternatives, the left-wing socialist or green anti-growth parties did not manage to achieve the sort of result they were almost certain of.

Sinn Fein’s poor showing indicates that Ireland, despite past support and lip service still being paid to the idea of unification, would like to leave the problems of Northern Ireland somewhere else – Britain, as it happens.

This is rather a set-back for Mr Adams and makes that over-hasty agreement between him and the Rev. Ian Paisley pointless.

In the same way, as Mr Godson, points out:

Third, the reverses inflicted on assorted anti-American and single issue candidates, including those against US military landing rights at Shannon airport, were a sign that the voters want the State to play its full part in the international system - even in neutral Ireland.

Read the whole piece. It gives one furiously to think.

COMMENT THREAD