Varadkar is the straight-talker but it’s Martin who speaks from the heart
Who now speaks for the real Fianna Fáil? Since Micheál Martin’s dramatic Dáil speech on Thursday where he changed his lifetime support for the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution, there has been much commentary about a schism in Fianna Fáil and dark mutterings from some corners about the party’s eighth leader and, indeed, his future as head of the Soldiers of Destiny.
During Martin’s brave and dignified speech, Twitter was breathlessly announcing itself to be stunned. When it was over, we were told that the members of the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party were equally shocked by the declaration that not only would their leader vote to repeal the Eighth, but that he would support the proposal to legalise abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.
It was dramatic stuff but there were plenty of clues the night before that something historic was on the way. On Wednesday, in the rarefied confines of the Merrion Hotel, Martin launched an important book which examines Fianna Fáil and what it has stood for since its foundation in 1926, with an equally important speech.
Edited by my DCU colleague Eoin O’Malley and Seán McGraw of the University of Notre Dame, and featuring your columnist, the book, One Party Dominance: Fianna Fáil And Irish Politics, explains how Fianna Fáil became the dominant party of the State and managed to maintain that position for eight decades.
To the large crowd of academics, journalists, and Fianna Fáil politicians and activists, Martin cut a relaxed figure. He didn’t seem remotely worried about poor polling, the confidenceand-supply agreement, the possibility of an early election, or indeed any angst on abortion that emerged from the parliamentary party meeting he had just left to launch the book.
HE MINGLED afterwards with the throngs and appeared at ease with where his party was now, and proud of its history. There was no overt sign of a man bearing the onerous responsibility of being on the cusp of making what might be the most important speech of his political career.
Yet to those listening carefully there were clues in his speech as to what he would say in the Dáil the next day. He bemoaned the peril of ideological inflexibility, stating that remaining committed to the same programme as realities change is not something to be admired.
He argued that liberal democracies which respond to the needs of the public are inherently centrist, and throughout its history Fianna Fáil had been a responsive and evolving centrist party. He argued that just as the demands of particular times have changed, so too had Fianna Fáil’s political programme. In response to significant failures and new problems different approaches had to be taken and were.
While Fianna Fáil’s critics have long accused the party of being made up of opportunistic political hucksters, willing to abandon any principle on the cause of political expediency, for Martin change should not really be a surprise because this core idea of being responsive to the public was the very reason why the party he led was founded.
He continued in this vein by asserting in ringing tones that the founders of Fianna Fáil believed simply sitting around and basking in ideological consistency benefited no one and was causing real harm.
On hearing this I turned around to my companion and said, there’s a man who’s going to make a big statement tomorrow on the Eighth Amendment and won’t be sitting on the fence. Any Fianna Fáiler listening to their leader on Wednesday would have known that he was not a prisoner to the past or to ideological dogma.
To his critics, Martin is indecisive: a minister who loved to commission reports. His supporters point instead to a politician of consummate courage and reference the smoking ban, brought in despite the hostility of the vintners, a group long associated with Fianna Fáil, and sceptics within the party itself.
Martin has been in the Dáil since 1989. Two episodes over 15 months defined him as a politician of substance. These were his challenge to Brian Cowen’s leadership in January 2011, and his reaction to the Mahon Tribunal’s findings against Bertie Ahern in March 2012. In the former, he went against the then-taoiseach, a man he had served with in Cabinet for over 13 years, and had the courage of his convictions to decry the coming of the IMF to Ireland.
In the latter, he proposed expelling an ex-taoiseach from the party for ‘conduct unbecoming a member’ in light of the tribunal’s rejection of evidence presented to it by Ahern.
These were courageous steps. The first was taken in the sure knowledge that Fianna Fáil was in for a hiding from the public in the election, and when many of the deputies who Martin had soldiered with couldn’t wait to get off the electoral pitch.
The second was taken when Martin led just 20 TDs in the Dáil and presided over a party which received 17% of the vote in the election a year earlier. Neither decision was taken for political expediency. Both were taken for the good of the party and both took on Fianna Fáil royalty. Most importantly, both were taken on the weight of evidence. Martin had come to the conclusion that if Cowen stayed on, the future of the party was at stake. On Ahern, the evidence showed Fianna Fáil had to cut its ties with its former leader.
The same principle applies to abortion. Both in the Dáil on Thursday and in a series of follow-up interviews, Martin eloquently described his own journey on abortion. He is instinctively on the pro-life side but has clearly been influenced by expert opinion and by the deliberations of the Citizens’ Assembly and the Committee on the Eighth Amendment.
He has listened to the evidence and come to a conclusion. In many ways it is the logical outcome of his 30-year career. For Martin, he is being true to the values of Fianna Fáil in being responsive to the public given that public opinion has dramatically shifted.
MARTIN knows this is an issue that goes beyond partisan politics and is essentially one of conscience. This is a bit of an each-way bet for Martin, as he has correctly concluded that his support for repeal won’t cost votes at the general election, just as Labour’s support for same-sex marriage won it no votes in 2016.
Despite mutterings about his leadership, Martin is safe. He brought Fianna Fáil from the edge of extinction in 2011 to the brink of power in 2016. He is a formidable campaigner and with an election that will be fought on the economy, housing and health, the party has no alternative chieftain.
The reality is that the numbers who might vote on abortion in a general election are miniscule. In that context, it doesn’t matter if Martin can’t bring his parliamentary party, or even the Fianna Fáil heartlands, with him. What matters is that he has been brave and decisive in saying Fianna Fáil is a broad church when it comes to matters of conscience.
While Leo Varadkar has the reputation for plain speaking, it is Martin who has evidently spoken from the heart on this issue. No matter the outcome of the referendum, history will judge him kindly for it.