‘Unlikely’ Labour will go into government with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil – Bacik

By Gráinne Ní Aodha, PA

It is “unlikely” that Labour will go into government with Fine Gael and Fiánna Fail, party leader Ivana Bacik has said.

It comes as a Fianna Fáil TD said at this stage it appeared that independents were “more interested” in government formation talks than Labour or the Social Democrats.

Exploratory talks between political parties have been held this week with the aim of forming a government in the new year.

Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, who are just a couple of seats short of a majority of 88, said they had a “positive and constructive” initial discussion with one another on Wednesday.

The Social Democrats said they would continue to engage with Fine Gael and Finna Fáil next week, as well as Sinn Féin and the Labour Party.

After a meeting of Labour’s parliamentary party, Ms Bacik said they had not yet received a “substantive” response from Fianna Fáil nor Fine Gael to the party’s priorities for government.

She said: “We are not under any illusions. We’re conscious of the numbers in the Dáil, but we do also have a duty to engage fully and to ensure that we are giving every opportunity to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to provide us with with their response to the policy priorities that we’ve outlined.”

She added that the “very small gap” between the two big parties and an overall majority would mean a small party would have “very little capacity, influence or leverage” to deliver on its priorities.

“We want to see a state construction company, we’ve been really clear about that. But equally, Micheál Martin has been very clear about his scepticism about that and these are the real policy differences that we have,” she said.

“This is what we discussed on Tuesday, but we want to give those discussions a little more focus and substance.”

“I wouldn’t understate the policy gulf between the Labour Party and Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil,” Louth TD and Labour parliamentary party chair Ged Nash said.

“I have said right throughout the campaign, based on the very detailed economic and fiscal document that we published, that our own position and that of Fianna Fáil – and Fine Gael especially – around tax cuts and the management of the economy, that is a huge divide that is potentially unbridgeable. We have not received a response to that.”

Fianna Fáil TD for Clare Timmy Dooley said that “it remains to be decided” how stable a coalition that included independents would be.

“There’s nobody putting pressure on anybody, there’s still time for those other parties such as Labour and the Social Democrats to decide do they want to participate and do they want to enter more formal discussions and negotiations.

“The independents from the start appeared to be quite interested,” he said on RTÉ’s Today with Claire Byrne programme.

Taoiseach Simon Harris said he had met each of the eight independent TDs in the Regional Group and did not doubt their “sincerity or bona fides”.

The Fine Gael leader said it would be “absolutely essential” that the next government has a “whipped majority” in order to pass five budgets and any confidence votes.

He said the fact that a group had been set up and a point of contact for government talks appointed was a sign of “a group of independent TDs who are serious about doing business in terms of being a constructive force in government”.

“But absolutely there will be a moment of truth, a crunch moment where every individual TD, including in Fine Gael, will have to sign up and commit to delivering the programme for government and voting with the government,” he said.

“It will be for us to work through that process for how best that structure is in place.”

He added: “We have seen in the past how it is possible to work with independents in government and work successfully with them in government.”

He said that key to this would be getting the structure of government right, such as the leaders meeting on Monday night in the last coalition, which he said had prevented “public disagreements and clashes on policy”.

The new Dail parliament of 174 TDs is to sit for the first time next Wednesday.

Elsewhere on Friday, Sinn Féin said it had nominated Aengus O Snodaigh to become the next Ceann Comhairle.

Mary Lou McDonald said Mr O Snodaigh was an “outstanding parliamentarian”, noting his proficiency with the Irish language and more than 22 years of experience in the Dail.

“Aengus has a sharp intellect and has a first-rate understanding of parliamentary process and procedures. He is highly respected right across the Oireachtas community,” she said.

Other possible candidates include incumbent Sean O Fearghail, his Fianna Fail colleague John McGuinness and the Regional Group’s Verona Murphy.