Image matters and the Taoiseach needs to be sure his fans don’t let zeal cloud their better judgment
EOGHAN Murphy, for whatever reason, decided to grow a beard as his ministerial career gathered pace. For his part, Michael Healy Rae continues to maintain an assorted range of headgear to mask a more follically challenged part of his demeanour.
Behavioural psychologists would undoubtedly have great fun analysing the motivations of the quintessential South Dublin TD – coupled with his decidedly more rustic counterpart – and the visual persona they each like to present to the world.
On one level such trivia is ephemeral and relatively meaningless. But such minor matters do provide some insight as to how both politicians try to influence the way they are perceived by the public.
Those in the public eye, by definition, must be fixated on what others think of them. Eoghan and Michael know their political survival depends on their instinct for that great unknown – the ever-shifting sands of public opinion. The face they put forward to confront the world, and the sense of individualism they create for the electorate, is certainly no minor matter.
They know full well voters can be cruel, uncaring and extraordinarily fickle. Most frustrating of all for our public representatives is that what has been termed ‘the great unwashed’ often makes its judgments on the flimsiest of evidence. So it’s no wonder the typical TD lives with a gnawing unease that whenever the next election may be it could be the one to see him turfed out of Leinster House.
They know they are holding down the kind of job where sometimes it seems logic makes no sense.
Many a political career has bit the dust, or ambition for further advancement thwarted, for no other reason than wayward public opinion.
Equally there are those politicians who hit the dizzy heights who are clearly of limited ability and in some cases harbour a dodgy moral compass. Those who believe in the maxim “life is inherently unfair” will be convinced it can be even more so in the Leinster House cauldron.
This is where image comes in. Growing a beard or wearing a cap indoors are but outward manifestations of often subliminal efforts to reinforce a certain public presence.
Political parties are also fully aware they can be desperately dependant on the dark arts linked to the world of public relations. The demands of a nonstop, 24-hour news cycle, on television and the web means many politicians are fixated more than ever with so-called brand awareness.
Against this backdrop there has been much hot air, and a fair dollop of hypocrisy, in the outrage provoked by the Leo Varadkar-inspired Strategic Communications Unit fiasco.
The moniker – SCU – has now surely entered our political lexicon. Yet one would have thought, based on some of the holier-than-thou cries of foul coming from the Opposition benches, Dáil deputies on that side of the House care little for their own public image.
The reality is that Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin are two organisations especially conscious of the importance of modern marketing. And so they should be.
However, there is no denying Varadkar’s attempt to bring image fixing to an unprecedented level in this country was astonishing in its naïvety.
The basic problem is that his Communications Unit confused the provision of information for the public with party politicking.
It is a very thin line. But the reality is that the task of explaining government department initiatives to the public – while drawing on the resources of civil servants and State funding to do so – cannot be part of a Fine Gael “spin machine”. There is a perception the SCU may have lost the run of itself, such was its fixation to bolster support for the Taoiseach and his party.
Whatever Varadkar’s long-term plans may be in this area, he needs to go back to the drawing board and reassess the specific terms of reference for the SCU or its successor.
Reform of some sort is needed, given an astonishing €178m is the yearly spend on sundry “communications” activities by the public service. But such a process simply cannot be seen as directly whipping up votes for Fine Gael candidates come election time.
A halt has now been put to what was an over-the-top approach by the newfangled unit – far too heavy-handed, when putting an extra sheen on things, to make the Government look good.
Tony Blair’s one-time spin doctor Alastair Campbell in his autobiography shows that “news management” in the interest of a political party, especially, needs a deft touch. The approach cannot be too overt.
IN time the row over the SCU will fade. But the Opposition parties will be watchful if they can stir up more controversies. They scent blood. The Varadkar determination to stay “on message” has resulted in some humiliating back peddling. It’s a reminder to the Taoiseach that while he is embroiled in major matters of state such as Brexit, trouble of the most unusual kind can erupt in the most unlikely quarters.
The real danger is that an SCU-style unit could have echoes of a US body created during the Richard Nixon era.
Its acronym was Creep – Committee for the Re-election of the President. Such was its machinations it eventually led to the Watergate scandal and Nixon leaving the White House in ignominy.
No one would suggest any kind of direct comparison between the SCU and Creep. But there are lessons be learned.
Nixon later bewailed the excesses of those charged with trying to get him back into power. “Their zeal exceeded their judgment,” he thundered when it was all too late.
That might be as good an explanation as any as to why the SCU strayed so seriously off course. Some of those involved certainly allowed their zeal to exceed their judgment.