Remember Vote No to Get Seanad Reform?

10 years ago, a very unusual alliance was assembled across the parties in Irish politics. The purpose of the alliance was to pretend they were passionately in favour of reforming Seanad Eireann to make it more democratic.

They issued leaflets, launched online campaigns, discussing ideas for reform at summer schools and debated people earnestly about the need for reform. What was most interesting about them was that up to the moment the Oireachtas passed Enda Kenny’s Seanad abolition bill many of them had spent decades, yes decades, opposing even minor reforms.

They opposed reform for very clear reasons. It was in their own own best interest to preserve the upper house in its current form, as an ejector seat for people who failed to be elected to Dail Eireann, or as a nursery for those aspiring to. But they also knew that  advocating for the status quo would simply not be popular. So overnight they became “reformers”. Sure enough when the referendum came about the proposal to abolish the Seanad was narrowly defeated and many reasonable people would say that it was probably on the basis that the majority of voters believed that they would rather retain the house but in a reformed way.

That was 10 years ago, and you have to ask yourself what happened to all those earnest reformers who promised that a No vote was a vote for reform? Some just laughed and went back to politics as usual. Some keep up the pretence, that reform is needed but there is no “consensus”, a rule which is never applied to Oireachtas salaries, funnily enough.

It was possibly the most cynical election campaign ever in Irish politics, where people who blatantly oppose something shouted for reform in public, despite the fact that they had absolutely no intention ever following through the reforms they advocated.

Until now, with the government’s proposal for a referendum to have an elected mayor for Dublin. Because there are two groups in particular who want to see the proposal defeated: opponents of Fianna Fail/Fine Gael, and…Fianna Fail/Fine Gael.

That’s the awkward reality: most of the people advocating an elected mayor IN PUBLIC are actually against it in private. Like the fake Seanad reformers, they are perfectly happy with the status quo, where councillors get €45k and a year in the spotlight without being held responsible for anything.

But they don’t want to admit it in public, and so spend years debating what would be the perfect form of elected mayor, and bouncing it between citizen assemblies and Oireachtas committees all with the intention of never genuinely pushing it.

Don’t believe me? Look at the half-assed campaigns FF/FG ran for the mayoral campaigns in Limerick, Cork and Waterford. Why did they even pick just those counties? Why not hold a vote in every county on the same day? Because that would have created a national debate, and we would have ended up with a dozen or so countries voting for elected mayors and it would then be a reality. Instead, the three county referendum was neither here nor there, a fig leaf to wave to see how committed they were to reform but not on a national scale.

But the greatest most cynical ploy of the proposed referendum will be that the people who oppose everything FF/FG do will be thinking they’re sticking it to the two parties by voting no, when they are actually voting for the status quo FF/FG and others want. They vote no thinking “fuck the politicians” and in reality voting to preserve the status quo the politicians really want.

Don’t believe me? Look how quickly Seanad reform was abandoned as soon as Seanad abolition was off the table.

In the 2002 general election the late Jim Mitchell TD was dismissed by the voters of Dublin Central. Mitchell had been first elected in 1977, and had gained a reputation as a solid constituency work, winning working class votes for a party more openly identified as middle class. In the run-up to the 2002 election, Mitchell had moved constituency and lost a lot of his base in a boundary change. It was also true that the election was a disaster for Fine Gael, being their worst electoral result since 1948.

But what was particularly noticeable was that Mitchell had been one of the most high profile politicians in the country as a result of chairing a very visible parliamentary investigation into tax evasion in the banks, which resulted in one bank making a settlement of €90 million with the Revenue.

Following his defeat, Mitchell blamed his own poor health (which took his life later in the year) as a factor in his inability to campaign as hard as he felt was necessary to keep his seat, where he got just over 11% of the first preference vote.

Yet here was a man who had spent the previous two years working in parliament  (and therefore not in his constituency) to recover millions in unpaid taxes, money which could then be spent on public services in Dublin Central and elsewhere. Wouldn’t you think that at least 15%-20% of Dublin Central voters could have rewarded him with their first preference votes for that alone?

Indeed, Irish voters have a history of not only not rewarding politicians who openly challenge corruption (Pat O’Malley, Trevor Sargent) but lavishing votes on openly corrupt ones. We all know of deputies and cllrs who have been caught thieving who were then re-elected.

Which begs the question: is there a vote for a pol who openly pledges to spend their time engaged in parliamentary scrutiny, rather than being a bionic county councillor? The history says no. But on the other hand, has any credible well-known candidate actually run on that platform in recent years?

We have a multi-seat constituency electoral system. It’s not beyond the bounds of the possible that 15-25% of voters in a constituency may not actually want a serious person in the Dail alongside the other super social workers?

There’s a poll in today’s Irish Times that says that only a mere 9% of voters want tax cuts, and the vast majority want any government surplus to be spent on public services and infrastructure.
I simply don’t believe that is what Irish voters believe.
I certainly accept that is what they told pollsters, because What Will The Neighbours Say is the core defining ideology in Ireland, and it is simply the done thing in our polite nominally centre left society to say you favour increased public spending over tax reduction.
But do they believe it?
Put it another way: if the Revenue sent out tax rebates cheques to every PAYE worker, with an option to tick a box and return the money back to be spent on public spending, would 91% of cheques come back to the Revenue?
They would in their bollocks.

One of the issues of modern politics is the question of unfair expectations from voters. Irish politicians are relying more and more on creating a high barrier as to what voters should expect in government, to such a vague and non-metric extent that even if a government delivers on many aspects of service delivery it still leaves a disappointed electorate. Rather than promise “Affordable housing” or “a world-class health service” would it not be better for politicians to promise ultra-specific policy objectives which can be clearly seen to have been delivered or not?

What would those specific measurable promises look like? Here’s a few to ponder.

1. A dole payment of X.
2. A minimum wage of Y.
3. A state pension of Z.
4. Treatment from an A&E doctor, free at point of need, within 90 minutes.
5. A one bedroom apartment between the Dublin canals for a monthly rent not exceeding €800.
6. An appointment with a HSE consultant within eight weeks.
7. A Garda response at your home/business door within 20 minutes.
8. A seniorcare visit once every three days as minimum.

These are off the top of my head, and I’m sure you, dear readers, can come up with more. My point is that all those above are clear identifiable as having being delivered or not by ordinary citizens. Would it be a bad thing if our pols focussed on specific delivery rather than generalised over-emotional guff?