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GOVERNMENT FORMATION DISCUSSIONS should pick up pace from next week as Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have finally conceded that they have to get into a room together for talks.
Since the general election result, government formation plans have been moving at a glacial pace.
There has been talk about talks, with phrases like “preliminary talks” and “exploratory talks” being bandied around in the last couple of days.
Sinn Féin has been leading the march, sitting down with many of the smaller parties and Independents in the last week to sound out the possibilities of a left-led government.
The party also held meetings with the top civil servants on how to turn its election promises into programme for government realities.
There are 87 TDs who are not members of Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil and of these, 37 are Sinn Féin members.
This means that Sinn Féin has the enormous task of convincing 50 other TDs to sign up to government formation with them – or at least, agree to abstain in major votes in a confidence and supply arrangement.
With Labour ruled out after stating that its six members did not get a mandate to enter government, it means if every single other TD, aside from FF and FG members, signed up with Sinn Féin, the party would exceed the magic number with 81 seats.
Despite what many would say is an impossible task, talks continue into their third week.
So who is talking to who?
Fianna Fail and Fine Gael have both ruled out talking to Sinn Féin. There has been no movement there.
However, Leo Varadkar and Micheál Martin did speak by phone after both leaders lost the vote to become the next Taoiseach on Thursday.
They agreed to meet early next week – though the location of where the chat will take place has not been disclosed.
A lot will hinge on this meeting.
Varadkar said in Brussels that his party is preparing to go into opposition, but that next week’s meeting will allow both leaders to discuss “ways forward”.
The leaders have been tight-lipped about what will be on the agenda, but the potential of a so-called grand coalition involving their parties and the possibility of a rotating taoiseach will most likely be up for discussion.
(Remember, these were two issues also discussed back in 2016 when it took 70 days to form a government).
After the meeting, Varadkar said he will brief the Fine Gael parliamentary party, probably on Wednesday or Thursday. He has yet to appoint his party’s negotiating team, though senior party figures are likely to feature on the team. Names in the mix include Simon Coveney, Paschal Donohoe and Helen McEntee.
The party’s last parliamentary meeting lasted over five hours, so its next meeting might also be a long one, as TDs set out why Fine Gael should or should not enter into a coalition with Fianna Fáil or why another confidence and supply might be a bad move for both parties.
While the spotlight will be on Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael from early next week, Sinn Féin will continue its discussions with the Green Party, the Social Democrats, the Labour Party, Solidarity-People Before Profit, Independents4Change and a range of other Independents.
Speaking yesterday, Mary Lou McDonald said: “Despite the rejection of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael’s record over the past four years, they are now looking for a carve-up of political power that is about keeping them in office and blocking change.”
“Any such proposal flies in the face of what people voted for and does not represent change,” she said.
Next week’s discussions for Sinn Féin will focus on issues such as building homes, cutting rents and freezing them, guaranteeing the pension age at sixty-five, health and the trolley crisis, climate change and Irish Unity.
The Social Democrats are due to meet both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael next week.
A meeting between the Green Party and the Social Democrats is due to last a day and a half, with the location mooted to be in Dublin Castle.
The Green Party – who could perhaps be the kingmakers in these negotiations – also has a busy week ahead. Plans are afoot for the party to meet with Sinn Féin on Monday or Tuesday.
Eamon Ryan will meet with Fianna Fáil on Wednesday or Thursday. A meeting with Fine Gael will follow.
In terms of Independent TDs, many are going solo with their talks with parties.
While a regional technical parliamentary grouping was established, consisting of Cathal Berry, Sean Canney, Peter Fitzpatrick, Noel Grealish, Michael Lowry, Verona Murphy, Denis Naughten, Matt Shanahan and Peadar Toibin, its members state that it was only set up to establish speaking rights in the Dáil.
It is not a grouping entering into talks together, said one TD, who said there were some members in the group that he could not sit around a table with for talks, They added that they had been engaging with a number of parties in recent days.
How do they see it ending up? “Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, the Greens, the Social Democrats and a couple of Independents to give it a whiff of a national parliament,” they said.
Just two weeks out from the election, and it’s still all to play for.
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Lieo and Mehole don’t do democracy.
Anything to hold power.
Half a million SF votes to be ignored.
Tide is closing in on this FFG party.
@Willy Mc Entire: FFG as you call them got around 350k more votes than SF. FF have most seats. Democracy at work.
@Hector Son: BS, SF and FF have the same amount of seats
@Willy Mc Entire: well if SF/iRA have all the cards let them form a govt ?. She does not want FF or FG I’m govt.
@Hector Son: So you agree they are but 1 :-)
@Willy Mc Entire: that’s called Democracy pal, starting to look like that’s something that doesn’t sit well with you.
@Pseudonym: correct, but nobody wants to play with the bully.
@smart cat: SF/iRA?? Who the blazes are they? There is no party named SF/iRA in this country.
@David Corrigan: there isn’t one called FFG either, doesn’t stop shinners banging on about it.
(this is me borrowing the sf deflection/whataboutery tactics)
@Hector Son: How very strange. If FF and FG do go together to keep SF out, then they can be called FFG going forward.
@David Corrigan: And if SF keep covering up murders for the IRA they should be called SFIRA.
@Willy Mc Entire: Ya, democracy is a pain. I think the system should be changed to who ever gets the most first preference votes gets to rule. The others should be whipped and then exiled. Some could be taught to retro fit ATM machines that “fall” out of banks.
@Hector Son: so your admitting you see them as one party while they claim to be two.. Ah I see
@Manbackonboard: some could wash some diesel or sell illegally imported tobacco or murder detectives guarding cash in transit.
@Fred the Muss: I and everyone else in this country have absolutely no idea what you are talking about Fred. It’s time you moved on. The people of this country don’t fall for that kind of nonsense talk anymore to be honest.
@Manbackonboard: I agree. To hell with the 51% rule.
@David Corrigan: I know what he’s talking about
@Hector Son: FFG. Will of course go into colition again..( National Interest ).Will be their mantra. The status quo will be kept intact and the circus will continue.
@Donal Desmond: fingers crossed Donal. Let’s keep this economy with it’s full employment going.
@Willy Mc Entire: Wheres the risen or are you him.
SF propagandists abound.
Lets explain that each seat in the Dail is equal. SF got 14 more this election. This has morphed into a landslide.
They have no majority and the support of 43 more needed to be in Govt.
So all the posing and playacting together with tiocfaidh ar la taunts are meaningless. So off you go into opposition and leave governing to grown ups. Martin nailed your toxicity and skewered Mary looper. Senior hurling now.
@David Glynn: The two traditional largest parties, FF & FG, used pull in easily 65-75% if not more of the vote between them. This time around they roughly got 25% each. SF also got roughly 25% of the vote this time around, a huge leap forward for them, an embarrassing setback for FF & FG. We both believe in democracy so what does that change in figures tell you?
@Hector Son: Full employment? Part time jobs make up a high percentage of a report by CSO issued a week before the election. While welcoming employment figures, other factors make these figures meaningless… Rent costs, deductions from wages, Workers still paying for gangsterism of the banks and developers . The so called recovery was for the banks and big business, not for the ordinary people of Ireland.
@Donal Desmond: Agree, Seetec & Job-Bridge jobs to massage the unemployment figure. Jobs with no benefits, minimum pay and zero-hour contracts. The Minister who introduced these ghastly schemes into Ireland from the UK, Regina Doherty, was sent packing two weeks ago and rightly so.
@Hector Son: I didn’t know a vote for FF was a vote for FG and vice versa. We’ve already had FF-FG so their voters had their fun – now it’s time for SF.
@Peter McGlynn: slight problem there Peter…SF didn’t win enough seats, it will be a FF/FG/GP coalition, all going well.
@Hector Son: all going well my Ar53
One last spin on the gravy train for these two.this ‘pact’ they are forming will destroy both parties at the next election.sinn fein will now be the biggest party in opposition which suits them to rattle the establishment until they fall off their perch.next election sinn Fein will run more candidates and then be the outright biggest party.
@nicknack: I love it when the Shinners now claim all swing voters as their own.
Don’t be so sure that you are going to win more seats next time around. Also that famous Irish Times poll before the election that put the wind behind SF’s back say only 1% of people here say a United Ireland a is a priority for them. Keep banging on about that and those swing votes are gone.
@Fred the Muss: yes sinn Fein will win more seats next time around.the landslide they won in first preference votes prove that.the demographics on the amount of youth that voted for sinn Fein also proves that.you and your ilk your time is running out.the next election will show that sinn Fein will be the largest outright party in this country
@nicknack: no it won’t because 75% of the voting population know what SF are about and will never vote the likes of them, UP..DEMOCRACY
@nicknack: Whilst I didn’t vote for FF, FG or the Greens, I’d much prefer them in power rather than any combination including SF.
If FF & FG have any brains whatsoever, they’ll create a giveaway Government for the next 5 years, to try & claw back some support from the electorate & send SF back where they belong in the doldrums.
@Fred the Muss: Sinn Fein Second biggest party in the 26 counties concerning the amount of T.Ds. F.F. lost seats, F.G. lost
seats, All the propaganda emitting from mainstream media especially RTE has backfired. The cosy cartel of FFG is under threat, FFGs next move is (National Interest)..
@talksense: of that 75% as you say didn’t vote sf i would be confident enough to claim a large % were actual sf transfers
Like it or not only 40% voted for socialist left leaning candidates. If democracy truly exists then it should be ff FG in government.
@john s: but, FF and FG are political foes. They represent very different things. Oops, sorry. Got that wrong. They are exactly the same and their combined vote is now being referred to as a single vote.
But if you look at it another way, people voted first for SF and then for FF. Surely having the 2 most popular parties making up a government would be more democratic.
@Anne Marie Devlin: true, but only if they can agree on policy. Both sides would have to compromise so much they would both lose support
@Anne Marie Devlin: people still voted FF and FG anyway. If people really hated them, they wouldn’t have voted them at all.
@Sean Wong: yaw loike
@Hector Son: I think I wrote a long reply the other night that’s basically the same as what you have put in here in a few lines. Well done on the economy of words, I need to work quality not quantity. I suppose a bit like SF.
@Anne Marie Devlin: on that criteria, every Government since the foundation of the State would have been made up of FF and FG
Either way well be stuck with two right (b)ankers
” What are we gonna do tonigh Brain? The same thing we do every night Pinky, try to take over the world!”
Aneyone in government just to keep out the shinners, they will run the country to the ground in 6 month’s, free house, free bus, double the dole, and the hard working tax payers will pay for it.
@Heisen berg1: run it into the ground??? 4 homeless died in the last 10 days.
Housing what housing
Hospitals waiting lists
Tax after tax
Can’t get any worst.
Why not Give them a go
give anyone else a go. let them prove it.
and if they F up then MeHole can come to the rescue and save us all.
@Heisen berg1: Think the hard working taxpayers are already paying for the gangsterism of the banks and developers facilitated by politicians. F.F. have a monopoly on ecomomicly braking the country, F.G.as usual made matters worse
.like choosing between the pox and the plague .
@Heisen berg1: they would be in thier right to stop the payment of 10 billion yearly to the european gangsters who are responsible for the homeless in Ireland
There the two lads that got picked last for the football team. The lasts ones left standing at the wall. All the best players picked first and the rejects MeHole and lieHole calling the shots.
More of the same!!!
Well at least there’s 4 homeless people wiped of there homeless list in the last couple of weeks. And we have loads more hotels to put the rest of them into in the next few months. As bad as they were there’s no way Bertie And Enda would have being so desperate as to stoop low.
MeHole selling his sole and the party’s just to get his hands on the captain’s armband. And lieHole taking the scraps just so he can sit there with his smug face looking at the lefties..
And he got in on the fifth count:)))
Ps I’m not a shinner I’m a joe soap. And We the joe soaps voted for change.
@pabloeskabab: enlighten us on how ‘Hairy Moo’, and the rest of the brigade of new politicians that appear to struggle to contain their pro-terrorist anti-Semitic rhetoric in check, plan to fix Ireland?
@Ro-your-nan: fixing Ireland is better than selling it like ffg.
@Denis Reidy: provide evidence that Ireland has been sold. Cheers.
Is there anyone in this country who could possibly believe a word from either of them.
Mehole just ordered an extra large tent, destination Galway, invite only
Whoever puts FG/ff into power is signing their own political death warrant.
They will never be forgiven.
@Pius Flynn: with 70+ seats between them that is what the electorate voted for. Sure, SF got a surge and will.be a player to come but please dont buy this American election ‘vote for change’ nonsense from SF The Irish electors voted for FF and FG. If SF wanted change they would denounce terrorism, the IRA, the thugs in its ranks… and come clean about the army council too.
@lambda sensor: but FF and FG combined won less than half the total seats. Also nearly all SF candidates topped the poll in their constituency being elected on the first count. I’d definitely call that a vote for change. How many counts did it take for Mehole to slither past the post? Leo the same..
@Shay Redmond.: Do you understand how PR STV works?
@lambda sensor: I compleley disagree with your comment on so many levels…
Martin and varadkar to meet on how to deal with sf problem..
If these two self serving sc#mb#gs decide they should resume their coalition again “in the national interest” there should be nationwide disobedience and protests against their contempt and arrogance for the people who voted for change in this country.
Has anyone calculated an hourly figure that’s it’s costing the exchequer while all of this posturing is going on?
Would give one a bad dose of changeitis.
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