Ireland's family politics
Mary Kenny
Dublin My mother votes for Fianna Fail because her mother worshipped de Valera. They were from the West of Ireland, my mother's family; they were Republicans who hated English landlords. My father's family were Free Staters — respectable, bourgeois Dubliners who supported Home Rule but had no particular cause to be anti-English. Thus were my mother's people followers of de Valera and Fianna Fail, and my father's adherents of Cosgrave (senior) and Fine Gael.
That is the way most people in Ireland learn modern Irish history — through the story of family allegiances. It is qttite a useful way of learning it, and possibly the only way of distinguishing the two main political parties in Ireland. Outside observers look at Fianna Fail and Fine Gael and fail to see what philosophical difference there is between them. It would be extremely hard to say, for example, which is supposed to be the right-wing one and which the left-wing. If, by `right-wing', you mean morally conservative, then both are right-wing. Both have a tough record on law and order, which some people associate with the Right. But if you were to look at the parties in terms of economics, both are strict Keynesians. In the coming general election in Ireland — which will take place on James Joyce's Bloomsday, 16 June — both the Government and the Opposition are offering big-spending rewards that even the Labour Party in Britain would consider inflationary. The Government, which is of course a coalition of Fine Gael with the minority Irish Labour Party, is promising to abolish rates on private dwellings, reduce taxation, increase welfare, expand the security forces and secure the fifty-mjle limit on fishing. The Opposition, FF, is promising to reduce income tax, abolish road tax, remove all discrimination against women, reduce social welfare stamps while expanding welfare benefits and introduce contraception legislation for married couples. Fianna Fail also proposes to borrow a massive amount of money for job investment. The Government is opposed to further borrowing.
'Does this mean that you have turned against deficit budgeting on principle?' I asked the Foreign Minister, Garret Fitzgerald. 'Not at all,' he replied. 'It just means that no one will lend us any more money.'
The Irish have the same economic problems as Britain, only worse. Inflation may be marginally lower at around 12i per cent but unemployment is painfully high; the Opposition claims it to be 15 per cent of the available labour force. Also there are poor prospects for oil, and there is a booming population. Since contraception is still banned, the Irish now have the highest birthrate in the Common Market; the average number of children is four to each family (as opposed to 1.8 in Britain). Fifty per cent of the Irish are now under twentyfive. Moreover, Ireland has changed from being a country of emigration to one of immigration. Many of the economic troubles in Ireland derive from the fact that the Irish are not exporting people any more. In the long run, that must be a good thing, because the haemorrhage of emigration damaged Ireland greatly in the past but, in the short run, which is what all their Keynesian economists are preoccupied with, it means they need to create 30,000 new jobs a year — when they've never done better than a third of that.
Furthermore, the young, who are most worried about jobs, are a huge factor in the election; first-time voters represent 20 per cent of all voters — 420,000 of them will he going to the polls for the first time.
On the face of it, this ought to be a dynamic political situation; a young electorate, a lot of economic problems, and a party system rooted not in political philosophies but in Civil War allegiances. And yet, contrary to the fiery image of the Irishman abroad, the bulk of the Irish at home are rather passive, slow to anger and still deeply fatalistic. They have low expee" tations of politicians and are quite hapPY with the dispensation of small favours. The attitude towards rising prices, for examPle' is reflected in the complete failure of OA' consumer movement outside Dublin, ariu even inside Dublin there is very P00( quality-control of food stuffs. The Irish are now importing food — potatoes fr° Cyprus, green vegetables from Israel, Convenience foods from Britain — and it neve! seems `to occur to the shopper that this 'S one of the things that puts prices up. , The unkind people who say that the Iri5" perished in famines because they lacked the initiative to take the fish out of the sea, or to hunt the birds of the air are, of course', historically wrong; but the acceptance 0' what seems to be ordained is nevertipless persistent Irish characteristic. One doer wonder why people will buy large bags ° potatoes (you cannot now buy potatoeh loose in most parts of Dublin), half of Whic are rotten, and not complain. By the sarr!,e, token one wonders if the new electorate W1',' simply accept the political system as it is, 01 set about changing it. This election will reveal to the Irish h0vit much, or how little, they have changed'n°,1 if the Government wins, as the punters saY will, one thing will have altered: 00: Fail, the 'natural' governing party of th southern Irish, will have lost two elections in a row, and will have thereby lost its griP(i De Valera is dead, and the very ojc 'Republican' has been shamefully dise,re:t dited by the Provisional IRA. And Wó does Fianna Fail stand for but de Valera nil Republicanism? 'In spite of all the cynicisrt's you hear I think there's still a slight bia, towards voting for the ruling Coalitionti, says a university student of his fellows. `Y°d see, Fianna Fail is the Republican partY Oat though they're very respectable and all d and say they would only want a urkite„ Ireland on peaceful terms — all the saln.t`,5 they've been tainted by the Provos. And I 0. coming home to more and more peop/e° that a United Ireland just isn't on.' The old ways die hard, nevertheles,Ss. Learning history through family traditicrel is also emotionally binding. My bot,d, Carlos, who is politically uncomnlitt'of loves to tell the swashbuckling storYthe Michael Collins asking a policeman 00 time, when he was on the run with a pricf,sa. his head. My fifteen-year-old nephew woe pproves of Collins. 'He was no good. "ve sided with the English. He shouldn't ha,ei signed the Treaty.' His great-grandnlot" would have been proud of him.
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