INSIDE THE ROOM How Leo answered his internal critics
ON PARTY UNEASE
‘I wouldn’t like people to think nothing has happened since Trim [a Fine Gael think-in, September 2021], that nothing has happened since the beginning of January. Actually, a lot has happened. It just doesn’t necessarily show yet.’ results
ON INCUMBENCY
‘It is easy to become demotivated. The burden of incumbency is heavy and gets heavier every year.
A lot of people are tired having worked so hard for so long. In opposition you get to take time off.
You really don’t in government. Your job follows you everywhere. Then of course a bad poll doesn’t help either.
The main way to motivate people is activity through the campaigns that are planned and also the commemorations that are planned.’
ON FG IDENTITY
‘I think Patrick [Deputy Patrick O’Donovan] made a good point on the fact that we can, as a party, have our own policies and have distinctive policies that are not necessarily Government ones. I am very comfortable with that, by the way.
We did that a bit with the care of the child and the media policy as well. Maybe we just need to be a bit braver on that and have individual policies that make us distinct from our Coalition partners without causing a row, of course.
One area I think we could do is a policy statement maybe on neutrality and security and the triple lock… setting out the fact FG is in favour of European defence, that we don’t agree with the triple lock.
I don’t think we need big, long documents but I think we could have a policy statement that the parliamentary party could adopt.
ON THE GREENS
‘Maybe energy security is another area we could have a bit of distinction from our Coalition partners on.
I haven’t seen the report yet, but I understand one of the options that might be put forward in the Government’s report on energy security is that we should have an LNG [liquefied natural gas] terminal, but it should be a Staterun LNG terminal.
That gets around the issue of importing fracked gas and actually is about storage, not about storing stuff to sell.
ON A PROJECT ENFORCER
‘That’s really only something you can do in the Taoiseach’s office. The Taoiseach’s Office has the power to make other departments do things and pull departments together and bang heads together. The Tánaiste’s office in the Taoiseach’s department doesn’t really have that clout quite frankly and that is just the truth of it.
Micheál and Bertie and Enda had economic advisers. I never had one because I had Paschal. I didn’t need one, but they would have had economic advisers like Andrew McDowell and Alan Ahearne.
I don’t think we have ever had a kind of adviser whose job is to sit on agencies and make them complete and deliver construction projects and other projects. Maybe that’s something we need to do.
It would be a particular type of person we would give that job to. It hasn’t really been done before. That is an idea, I think a kind of enforcer on capital projects and maybe an enforcer on other projects. Worth some thought and worth a try. You need the right person to do that though, someone who gets results without causing incidents.
ON VAT INCREASE
‘At a time of inflation, it would be very hard to explain why we’ve made the cost of services go up in August.
But that’s something we will have to talk to Paschal about it.
It’s something you could only really consider in the context of the Summer Economic Statement.
That rate going back up is factored into our numbers and there’s consequences obviously if it doesn’t go back up. point.’ I hear the
ON FG’S FORGOTTEN SUPPORTERS
‘I think we should start using the language of the taxpayer a bit again. We haven’t done that in ’ a while.
ON COST OF LIVING
‘I do hear the point about the speed and urgency of response. I think the public were impressed with how we responded with speed and urgency to issues like Covid and maybe to a lesser extent, Brexit and Ukraine.
They are frustrated that they don’t feel that we have responded with adequate urgency and adequate scale when it comes to other problems like housing, for example, and maybe the cost of living.
The fact that they can see what the Government can do when it comes to some things makes them even more annoyed when they don’t see us acting with the same level of urgency and response when it comes to other things.
But there are dilemmas there as well. On the excise issue like petrol and diesel, you know, we did think about doing that sooner, but there is a risk there when you do it it’s forgotten and then you’ve used your firepower. Like, it won’t be long before people tell us we’ve done nothing at all on petrol or diesel and that’s always the dilemma.
If you act quickly, you show you care, you show you get it, you show you’re acting with urgency and resolve. But once you fire your bow, you’ve fired your bow and that’s it.
We can’t go any lower on excise now because we’ve hit the lowest excise level in the energy ’ directive.
ON THE BURDENS OF OFFICE
‘One thing I would say certainly as well and certainly anyone who has held office will appreciate this: flagging issues is not the same as fixing them.
It’s not that hard to flag issues. It’s done very well in parliamentary party meetings. It’s also done on Liveline and the newspapers.
Flagging issues is important but it’s not the same… all the office holders know you need to solutions.’ find