Whatever you say, say nothing.

Usually the post general election period sees moves towards government formation with possible combinations entering exploratory talks.  Do you remember the old expression; “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” or “the negotiations teams have left matters for final decision to the party leaders”? 

You see here’s the rub. Everything is agreed but nobody has the backbone to admit it. Thursday will see everyone going through the motions until after St Patricks Day.  I suspect we will have a new government in the run in to Easter.  There is every incentive to form one.  The historic anniversary of 1916 and the sense of occasion appeal to the core of FF members.  Moreover what would the outgoing Minister for Education possibly say in the set piece speech to Teacher Union conferences during Easter Week? Such speeches set out the ministers policy in the year ahead and are the centrepiece of conference week. Jan O’Sullivan can’t deliver any such a speech and there is a need for a clear line from Marlboro St on junior cycle reform and the restoration of posts and increments. The more I think about it the more I believe we may get movement when the Taoiseach is away in the US for St Patricks Day to visit President Obama for the final time.

And as the old adage goes, when the cat’s away the mice will play.  It may well be by the time that Enda Kenny returns to Ireland the negotiators will have signed off on their programme and referred it upstairs to the party leaders.

FF and FG are sniffing one another over in the same way as an inquisitive terrier hangs around a rabbit hole.  The mood music is that they are the only game in town.  And here’s the really extraordinary bit.  Those who are cheering them the loudest are mostly those who won the argument; Sinn Fein AAA and the left on water charges and property tax. 

They say the numbers now don’t stack up.  A few weeks ago they said that there were 3 blocs, FF, FG and the Right2Change group.  Now SF and the left say do the maths a Right2change bloc hasn’t enough votes. 

So let’s take them up on the offer and do the maths. At the minute FG has 50, FF 44 and SF 23. But add in 6 PBP/AAA, 4 Independents for Change and the following independents who are all left wing and oppose water and property charges; Seamus Healey, Catherine Connolly, Maureen O’Sullivan, Finian McGrath, John Halligan, Thomas Pringle and Katherine Zappone.  That gives you a block of 40 TD’s with SF at its core and if the Social Democrats who have 3 TD’s opposed to water charges are included it could be level with FF if an FF TD is elected Ceann Comhairle.  If SF and this coalition went to FF they would be in just as good a bargaining position as FG since many independent TD’s may not be interested in holding ministerial office.  As Mary Lou herself says as she quotes Bobby Sands, “Everyone has their role to play”,  Is this merely a slogan or does it mean anything at all?

You see since the results of the General Election there has been considerable spin much of it encouraged by a left with little appetite for government.  That of course means that once a new government is formed, the vow of silence will be broken and all the answers to all the problems facing the country will once more tumble from the lips of those on the left.  Now that real issues are on the table, Paul Murphy and Richard Boyd Barrett are playing schtum on what should happen next.  They are going round with their fingers crossed behind their backs that the task of solving problems never ends up on their laps. It is for the left very much a case of reverse engines before we hit the iceberg.  Only in Ireland does the left interpret electoral success as a failure to secure a mandate.  If not now, then when, if ever?