The Irish political parties and election debates. Self-serving? Why yes! Would we expect any better? We would not.

I know this is late, but in a way and given the fall out from the British election it remains timely. The response of the political parties to the RTÉ proposals for a new look debate structure has been… typical. The idea is that it would be a three-fold process with the Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour leaders – whoever they might be come election time, debating amongst themselves first. Then there would be a debate between the Labour, Green Party and Sinn Féin leaders mid-way and finally a debate between the leaders of FF and FG.

Now, in fairness to the parties it’s hard to think of anything more calculated to infuriate the parties. Consider the response from Labour. Eamon Gilmore said:

Rejecting the concept that Labour would participate in a debate with the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael leaders at the start, but not at the end of the campaign, he said: “That’s like giving us a run-out in the first round of the championship and telling us we can’t play in the final.”

Well, yes.

Take Fianna Fáil:

Commenting on the proposals, a spokesman for Fianna Fáil said yesterday: “It is a bit premature at this stage considering there are two more years to run and such matters are rarely discussed until an election is close.
“Our view is that the existing format between possible taoisigh has worked well and the measure of that is the numbers of people last time who watched the debate.
“When the election is under way, these matters will come up for discussion with RTÉ and any other broadcasters seeking to host such debates.”

I like the ‘possible taoisigh’ quip. But really, is that even a serious line of argument. On the current figures it would appear that the Fianna Fáil leader isn’t in the running (and a letter in last weeks IT noted this). So in truth would that logically presuppose a studio with E. Kenny talking more or less to himself?

And speaking of Fine Gael, the putative Labour partner in government?

“The existing arrangement, where the outgoing Taoiseach and leader of the Opposition engage in a policy debate, is the way to go.

“If you move from that, the focus shifts to the debate process rather than a discussion on the relevant issues, which are jobs, health and political reform.”

Well, that’s a master class in making a point that is not precisely clear. Why would it be any less of a debate on those issues with three rather than two viewpoints?

And even the smaller battalions aren’t exactly thrilled by the current concept. First up let’s note a nice bit of camaraderie down amongst the er… smaller formations.

Green Party leader and Minister for the Environment John Gormley said the proposals were “incredible and totally unacceptable”. He called for a five-party debate that would include the Greens and Sinn Féin.

A Sinn Féin spokesman also rejected the plan: “This is completely unacceptable. It clearly benefits the larger parties because Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour get two bites of the cherry. If there is going to be multi-party debates, they should be all-party debates.”

Well of course it benefits the larger parties. Although nice of SF to include Labour in that category.

But in truth, why not have a five party debate? It’s large, but not impossible to hold. It would be considerably less unwieldy than some of ones that we saw during the US Presidential nominations and it would have the crucial democratic and representational element of including those who are actually… well, y’know elected.

And the thing is that if Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are clever so should they, because that would open up the possibility of pushing Labour towards what they might perceive as a ‘radical’ periphery as represented by Sinn Féin and to a lesser extent the Green Party. So not so much nice Mr. Gilmore, but instead Gilmore the harbinger of the radical left – and anyone who has followed Dáil debates will know that in extremis FF are always happy to chuck around the Workers’ Party years whenever it seems appropriate. By lumping Gilmore in with the others they could burnish their own pragmatic and sensible and mainstream credentials. It doesn’t have to happen that way, but that’s one way they could play it to their advantage.

Truth is there’s no way of doing this that isn’t going to present problems. Too many involved and the debate loses focus. Too few and it begins to distort the political process artificially by presenting simple binary choices. And all of us who belong to the left beyond the centre left – wherever that may leave us – know that even the broadest of choices in the Oireachtas is far from representative even of elected political strands in this state.

It’s here though that some of the most interesting implications of the rise of the Labour vote begin to impact. Because it’s only by taking the 2007 criteria that the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael approach can even be [slightly] legitimised. But the irony is that for the media, so of the now and the immediate, it more than likely will be locked into a context which prevailed three, maybe four years ago. And that in and of itself will make the debates appear irrelevant – unless Cowen could stage a storming recovery. And if he does then the flawed nature of the debate itself will have impacted, and arguably entirely unfairly, on the context of at the larger democratic process.

That said I think Labour could, as was suggested in comments on the CLR a while back make considerable hay out of this. I think the essential inequity of the situation is so obvious that it plays to their advantage. And for RTÉ this presents an exquisite dilemma given that both Fine Gael and Labour appear likely to be power following an election. Either way they alienate someone and perhaps that accounts for RTÉ’s innovation in this area.

But surely this is something that we need some more independent body than RTÉ to be determining?