Meltdown

A little under two years ago, after the local and European elections, this blog wrote piece titled ‘coalition governments’. Looking at the history of smaller parties in governments, it rather naively warned against entering a coalition as a minor party, as time and time again, they were eliminated come Election Day. In the time since that article was published, this trend has not changed. Last year, the Liberal Democrats suffered an excruciating painful defeat, and now verge on the edge of irrelevance. Today, the Irish Labour Party is witnessing a similar meltdown at the ballot box. It is a mathematical certainty that the next Irish government will require at least 1 junior partner. There will be no shortage of takers. The question therefore is; why, when there is substantial evidence to suggest that doing so will cost you dearly come the next election, do parties go into coalition government?

One theory is naivety, although perhaps by now, it should simply be called ignorance. ‘Yes every other party who went into coalition government was decimated come election time…… but not us!’ While there is some evidence to support this, it is highly unlikely that politicians are so gullible, and acutely unaware of trends and history. Another possibility could be a sense of public service. Yes, they are aware that they will suffer in the future for it, but the country needs them now. If we lose out, so be it, but we shall be able to hold our heads high, knowing that we have done the state some service. This is of course, a highly noble and altruistic outlook, and it may be tempting to view our elected leaders in this way, but alas, is unlikely to be their sole reasoning. A combination of the two is possible, a desire to help coupled with uncertainty over how the future will pan out.

However, it seems to me that the most likely reasoning as to why junior parties enter coalition, is the ‘lambs to the slaughter’ theory. A number of things are key here, and we take the Irish Labour party as an example. First, many junior parties, prior to entering coalition, witness large increases in their seats, filled mostly by first time TDs. Labour for example, went from 20 to 36 in 2011. These new seats are, incidentally, less safe than those previously held. Second, most decisions of a party are made, or at least heavily influenced by its old-guard leadership, which will almost always consist of long-time members in very safe seats. Thirdly, ministerial positions carry with them large salaries, very generous pensions, and look very prestigious on a CV. With this taken into account, there is little wonder as to why Labour entered government. They were fully aware of the consequences it would have on their party, but knew that most of the harm would be inflicted upon their more junior members. When one also considers that Pat Rabbitte, Eamon Gimore and Ruairi Quinn, all former leaders of the party, all declined to run in this election and chose to instead accept retirement, there can be little doubt as to why Labour is in the predicament it finds itself today.