MICHEAL MARTIN: WE’LL SPEED UP LOCKDOWN EXIT
Taoiseach-in-waiting pledges faster lifting of Covid-19 restrictions
FIANNA Fáil leader Micheál Martin believes that a programme for government can be agreed this week and one of the first tasks of the new coalition will be to accelerate the lifting of restrictions around the Covid-19 virus.
Mr Martin – who is bookies’ favourite to be taoiseach in a few weeks – tells the Irish Mail on Sunday in a wide-ranging interview today that he is confident he can convince his party to agree, in a postal vote, to a historic coalition of three parties.
Mr Martin, who is on the brink of reaching the pinnacle of political achievement, was in sparkling form in the sun as he
From Page One discussed how his party plans to get us out of lockdown quicker, how he enjoys pints of stout while talking to friends on Zoom and the political guidance he gets from reading about the life of King Henry VIII’s chief minister Thomas Cromwell.
When he sat down with the MoS on Friday, his satisfaction was palpable after meeting with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Green Party leader Eamon Ryan earlier that day.
As such, he wasn’t in the mood to criticise his soon-to-be partners in Fine Gael but he did outline a different path for a government that he is likely to lead next month.
Everything Mr Martin said must be considered in the context that he is almost certain to be taoiseach by the third week in June.
When he tells us what he envisages happening, it must be understood that he will be in a most powerful position in a coalition government to effect change in policies on the emergency.
Mr Martin envisages ‘accelerating’ the lifting of restrictions.
‘The roadmap itself is meant to be flexible and fluid,’ said Mr Martin, ‘so I think we can look forward to an acceleration of some aspects of it.’
Mr Martin said he has been ‘very clear’ that some changes can be brought in far more quickly to the five- and then 20km travel restrictions.
‘We feel, given that there’s very little community transmission now, that this has contracted the clusters. Given that we are told that the testing system is where it’s at now, there is room to bring forward, and to accelerate, some aspects of the roadmap, in my view.
‘I think, the critical issue there would be childcare and education for children with special needs,’ he said.
Mr Martin would not concede that he will definitely be taoiseach but he will certainly be in a powerful position to make changes.
He revealed that the negotiation teams have been working through the bank holiday weekend and are aiming to have a deal struck before the end of this week.
Mr Martin said: ‘I think we’re aiming for next week to try and bring these talks to a conclusion. Now I’m confident we can and it’s within our capacity to do it.’
Mr Martin stressed that the tortuous government formation talks face an unmissable deadline. The Fianna Fáil leader pointed out that vital financial legislation and antigangster laws must be passed before the end of June.
‘I think we have to form a government before those vital pieces of legislation are enacted,’ said Mr Martin, speaking to the MoS in an outdoor section of the Leinster House complex.
‘The public wants us to form a government. They feel the need for a government, particularly the small to medium-sized sector who are under huge pressure and very anxious about their futures.’
Legislation for European Investment Bank (EIB) emergency pandemic funding, renewing the writ of the Special Criminal Court and new Brexit legislation would all need to be enacted by the end of
June. A new Seanad would also have to be in operation.
‘That European measure is important, the need to support business through a combination of grants and zero-interest loans to enable cash flow for example, and also to enable them to offset some capital outlay that will be required to enable them to restart.’
Businesses will need grants to get going when the Covid-19 restrictions are lifted. There is additional pressure to pass the EIB legislation, as no European country can draw down emergency funding from the EU until all the countries have passed the laws. A failure by Ireland to pass this law would hold up the whole of Europe.
Also, gangland figures will not face justice unless the laws to renew the Offences Against the State Act and the Special Criminal Court are renewed.
Mr Martin confirmed that the Fianna Fáil ruling body of the Ard Comhairle will meet this week to change rules to allow the party’s 20,000 members to vote by a postal vote.
Fianna Fail’s membership, many of whom will remember the glory days of 80 seats or more under Bertie Ahern and Charles Haughey, will have to vote to allow the party enter government with its old enemy, Fine Gael.
‘It [a programme for government deal] then has to go to ballot to the individual parties. We have an extensive operation there because we have thousands of members and a lot of work has gone into logistically preparing for that and legally preparing for it to make sure it’s all done above board.
‘That really puts the pressure on next week, to try and get a resolution of some of the outstanding issues. People are working through the weekend on a variety of topics. The talks have been very earnest, very serious-minded. We come to the table as three different parties with different backgrounds, different manifestos in many areas. So by definition, and coordination, there has to be compromise from all sides.’
He confirmed that Fianna Fáil will vote, if the Ard Comhairle confirms that, on June 5.
‘The Ard Comhairle is meeting next week to give effect to a rule change which would facilitate a [postal] ballot, because the rule says it has to be specially convened Ard Fheis to approve a programme for government. We can’t have that because of Covid-19 so, therefore, we have to have a postal ballot.’
Mr Martin was asked whether he believes the membership will approve a coalition with Fine Gael and the Green Party.
‘I’m confident. It’ll be challenging but obviously when the programme for government is agreed, then I think we have some meat on the table to present to the members, because this is a government for five years. It’s not short term, because the current situation doesn’t allow for short-termism in decision making. We need to work together on economic recovery. We need to change the way society is in terms of the quality of life.
‘Am I confident we can get the membership to approve this programme for government. I’ve spoken to a lot of members, councillors, and members of the national executive and members of the party more generally, obviously they would prefer if we weren’t going
‘Talks have been very earnest’
‘We need to change the way society is’
NOW SEE JOHN LEE’S IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW WITH THE FIANNA FÁIL LEADER ON
into a coalition government, but they get the reality of the situation that the country comes first and the party, historically, has always put the country first. We shouldn’t be afraid to come to government to get things done for the country and to do well by the country in terms of our stewardship, so that would be the agenda, and that will be the key message that we’ve put into the membership.’
Mr Martin, though broadly supportive of the current Government and its following of public health advice during the crisis, has challenged it in the Dáil on its stewardship of nursing homes and on travel restrictions. He said he’s not a critic of Covid-19 strategy.
‘I, along with other party leaders, agreed at the outset of all of this that we would adhere to public advice. I think on nursing homes, as I’ve said in the Dáil, no response to an unprecedented pandemic can be error-free.
‘So I speak, not to attach blame. That we learn lessons from it. Can we correct the nursing home situation? We’re now learning even more because of the Covid committee’s work that they were left outside of the loop for too long.
‘At the outset of this crisis there was a huge emphasis on protecting the acute hospital system, protecting the intensive care system. You know what happened in Italy, and to a lesser extent in London in the early phases as a pandemic. The result being that many nursing homes were short of PPE.’
Mr Martin said: ‘It now seems patients inadvertently were sent from hospitals into nursing homes without testing being done in advance. We have to evaluate what went wrong in the nursing homes.
‘I raised issues around the 5km and 20km, because in other countries they managed to do well without necessarily having those restrictions in place.’
The former education minister believes that special provision must be made for the education of children with special needs. He backs a current Government plan to ensure the ‘July provision’ of education of these children happens this year.
‘I think, the critical issue there would be childcare... education for children with special needs,’ he said. ‘I think we need to move quickly on that. [There are] very, very sad stories emerging. Very difficult for parents, for children and young adults with autism who were very used to routine, who had to schedule and work for example, and whose whole life has been upended.’
Mr Martin also believes a bailout will be needed for the third-level sector.