Ireland after the elections: historical opportunity for the left

The elections in Ireland revealed a historical opportunity for the left if the correct approach and ideas are adopted. In Dublin, in particular, there was a marked shift to the left. Now the workers will expect some real change from the left, which however is only possible by changing the right-wing reformist policies of the Labour Party, and building a united front of the left wherever possible.

Fightback is the journal the International Marxist Tendency is planning to launch in Ireland

The Elections in Ireland for the county councils and the European parliament mark another nail in the coffin for the ruling Fianna Fáil and Green coalition. The FF vote fell by around 20% resulting in the loss of 84 seats while the Green vote fell dramatically leaving them with just 3 seats nationally from 18 in 2004. The vote for Fine Gael rose to 32% giving them an extra 47 seats. So the two right wing parties together gained 57 percent of votes (59 percent in 2004) on a 58% poll. Superficially this means another bourgeois party took the lead in the polls and the correlation of forces between the classes in Ireland stayed more or less the same. However, a closer look reveals a historical opportunity for the left if the correct approach and ideas are adopted.

In the local elections which, unlike the European polls, will have immediate and direct effects on the lives of Irish workers, the left vote (for the major parties: Labour and Sinn Féin) marginally increased. Their share of votes rose from 22 to 23 percent at a national level between 2004 and 2009. It has to be said of course that the demolition of the ostensibly left Green Party in the elections reflected their coalition with Fianna Fáil. The main winner nationally on the left was Labour who increased their Council representation by 31 seats to 132 gaining 276,600 votes.

But, this was the lowest result ever for the ruling FF. It took place against the backdrop of a huge crisis in the Irish economy and within society. The Irish economy doubled in size in the period 1995–2007. Now that process has been thrown into reverse. The economy is in freefall and will contract by more or less 10% this year. For Marxists the mood within the working class and the outcome for the workers’ parties in the elections is important to analyse. Obviously, we can’t expect any political, social or economic change if there is just a shift from one right-wing party to another. But there are other changes taking place which are far more important.

The shift to the left has been marked in the Dublin area. The left now has a majority in three out of the four county councils:

Dublin County Council total of 52 seats
Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil 18 seats
Labour 19 seats, Sinn Féin 7 , People before Profit 2 a total of 28

Fingal County Council total of 24 seats
Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil 10 seats
Labour 9 and the Socialist Party 3 making 12 seats

South Dublin County total 26 seats
Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil 12 seats
Labour 9, Sinn Féin 3, and people before Profit 1 (a total of 13 seats).

The Green Party in coalition with FF lost all its 4 council seats in Dublin. Sinn Féin has also lost an average 2.4 percent of the vote. The Right wing, FF and FG, together lost 3.9% of the votes. The winner was the Labour Party with a gain of 6.2%. Labour scored 14.7% nationally. The SP and PBP presented a few candidates in the Dublin area, but did well and a number were elected (3 from the SP and 5 PBP). The most impressive result was, however, in the EU election where Joe Higgins of the Socialist Party, won a seat with 12.4 percent of the votes. To summarise, the left vote, which has increased significantly, has gone mainly to Labour but also to the radical left, which reflects a class polarisation. It is also interesting to note that Joe’s election reflects his own personal standing which dates back to his position as a TD until the last General Election and even further back to when he was a Labour activist.

The right wing, therefore, has lost ground nationally but mainly in Dublin. FG has been in power a few times in the history of the state. But in the recent past it has been in the opposition to the government and in a broad front with Labour, which helped them put up a more progressive public face and blur their responsibilities for the present crisis in the eyes of the mass of the Irish population. Now FG has become the main force. The less advanced layers of workers still have to learn that bourgeois policies nationally and globally cannot provide a way out of the crisis. Individual performances of capitalist politicians are not the reason of the economic crisis, which is a crisis of the capitalist system. However, faithful to its class nature, FG has already clearly stated that more cutbacks will be introduced when they get to power, and that they are likely to favour further privatisations.

The pressure is mounting on the Labour leaders as well. The policies of the Labour leaders are the main reason for FG to have harvested the mounting mass opposition against the government. But the pressure of the organised labour movement upon the Labour Party has forced the LP leaders to move, at least verbally, to the left. Significantly they have been forced to call for “temporary” nationalisation of the banks and for support for families affected by the crisis. Given the massive problems economically where the live register is now over 400,000 unemployed and the ongoing industrial discontent, the trade union and Labour leaders are likely to be pushed further than they intend to go.

This will probably create the best conditions to a widening of the gap between Fine Gael and Labour reflecting an increasing polarisation within society, but only if a serious struggle is waged from the left within the Labour Party in order to change course to party policies. This will have obvious implications for any planned Fine Gael and Labour coalition plans.

Coalition

So far the Labour leaders could easily get away with murder. Their verbal opposition to the government has been a cover for right wing policies and the alliance with Fine Gael. On Monday 8th June, the candidate of SF to the EU parliament, Mary Lou MacDonald, correctly asked for a left block with the Labour Party in the television programme Questions and Answers. Joan Burton, from Labour, dodged the question. Instead, she said that Labour must focus on growing.

But this raises an important question. What are coalitions and fronts between parties meant for? From the point of view of the working class the last year has marked the failure of all trends in bourgeois politics. All capitalist policies have failed to prevent the crisis of capitalism as well as they have been proved unable to solve it.

What is the point then of building an alliance between the LP and Fine Gael (and maybe SF)? The main reason for that is that the ruling class needs to use the LP in a coalition government to carry out the policies that the FF-Greens government is unable to push through. It’s a trap that has successfully been applied in many other European countries. Last but not least in Italy with Rifondazione Comunista participating in a coalition government under Prodi. The treacherous policies of this government ended up in a crushing defeat for the left and were dearly paid by the parties of the working class with disastrous election results last year, creating the best conditions for a comeback of Berlusconi in power in an even stronger position.

As Marxists we should wage a battle against the involvement of the LP in coalition with bourgeois parties. What a genuine left should campaign for is for a united front of all workers’ parties, starting from where they have won enough support for taking over the government of councils, at a local level. A lead must be given to the labour movement in order to fight back the attacks of the bosses and the government on living conditions.

Of course, none of this will automatically happen unless a Marxist alternative is built within the ranks of the trade unions and the Labour Party. In spite of the apparent radicalisation of the Labour Party in the last period, there is a strong and dominant right-wing current, particularly among the leadership, that is anxious to go into a coalition government with FG when national elections take place. They will argue that Labour cannot miss an opportunity to implement some of its proposals and that they have to act with responsibility and avoid a vacuum of power, “we can deal with the crisis better than FF”, etc.

However, there is right now the possibility for the left of taking office locally in Dublin, and what the Labour Party do in Dublin now will have a certain effect on the growth of the Labour Party in the future. The Labour Party should act boldly and start defending the interests of the workers with socialist policies, in other words, put workers’ interests first.

Unemployment, as has been argued in other articles, is soaring to the levels of the dark 1980s. Cutbacks are affecting the living standards of those still at work, while the government bail out corrupt banks with billions of euros and the employers’ association (IBEC) is talking about reducing the minimum wage. Capitalists, their political lackeys in FF and FG and right-wing sectors within the Labour Party also put the interest of financial capital before people, and workers are starting to see through it.

A historical opportunity

This shift to the left took place primarily in Dublin because the left doesn’t have roots in the rural areas and could not stand candidates in many places. The Dublin area, with nearly one third of the population, is where the Irish working class is concentrated in the highest numbers.

Dublin is now a red city, which potentially could have an impact on the rest of the country. Potentially it could show how, with a clear programme, the left can improve the position of tens of thousands of workers. Collaboration between the left groups at a local level would be desirable if we are to see left policies implemented. However, sectarianism within the Socialist Party and People before Profit towards Labour are sharpened by the arrogant stand of the LP leaders. But this should not prevent organisations like the Socialist Party that claim to be revolutionary to understand that the mass of the working class is yet to be conquered to revolutionary policies. It is the duty of the revolutionaries to find a way to connect with the masses that still are supporting the reformist Labour leadership.

If a correct policy in relation with the LP is not pursued by the SP and PBF it could mean that an historical opportunity is missed, which is what Dublin workers voted for.

It has been claimed that these results represent a wonderful opportunity to build a new workers’ party in Ireland. This is a complete false and misleading demand. Furthermore, it is completely wrong. The truth is that despite the three seats that the SP won in Fingal on the back of Joe Higgins’ campaign and a seat in Cork the SP ended up with the same number of county councillors it had before –that is, before the massive crisis hit the state.

The majority of workers have illusions at the moment in the Labour leaders and many even in Fine Gael. The task of the Irish Marxist Tendency has to be to combat the muddled ideas of reformism on the one hand and ultra-leftism on the other. The slogan of a new workers’ party would, if successful, merely isolate a minority of the more class conscious workers from the rest.

It is significant that the Socialist Party programme has been watered down, with no clear demand for a Socialist United States of Europe in the Euro-elections or for the Nationalisation of the major industries under workers’ control and management. Even the demand for the nationalisation of the banks fails to mention workers’ control and management. This means that they are essentially advocating nationalisation on a capitalist bureaucratic basis, more or less like Gordon Brown in Britain.

Mass action and radical change

The opportunity for a radical shift in Labour policies is here now. For decades the LP leaders have managed to derail all aspirations for change amongst the workers on the lines of coalition policies with the “liberal” bourgeoisie.

The capitalist crisis has created the possibility for the emergence of a class conscious left opposition within the LP. If the Labour Party wants to start to implement left policies and begin to show that there is an alternative, the Dublin county councils are a place to start doing so. However, this would place Labour on a collision course with the FF/Green coalition, because no doubt the county councils will come under the cosh before long.

Before these elections the only perspective of achieving some degree of power, the capitalist wing within Labour argued, was by going into coalition governments with the right-wing parties. The truth is that in the coalitions of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s Labour only tail-ended capitalist interests and lost workers’ support. Labour must place itself at the forefront of the struggles of the working class; the social basis for the “social partnership” has been dragged from beneath the feet of the trade union and Labour leaders. Only the mass action of the working class and a clear socialist programme can defend the Irish working class.

Workers demand a radical change. Armed with the ideas and the method of Marxism it could be achieved, otherwise another opportunity will be missed.