Summer break offers Galway politicians a chance to take a good look at the local

World of Politics with Harry McGee – harrymcgee@gmail.com

An observation was once made of the American novelist Carson McCullers that the best part of all her books were the titles: The Ballad of the Sad Cafe; The Heart is A Lonely Hunter; The Member of the Wedding.

It’s true that she picked great titles but once you have read her work, you know her novels were also memorable.

A little bit like Tip O’Neill’s oft-quoted aphorism that “all politics is local”.

It sounds amazing but is it really true? Well, if you want to be really accurate it might read “most politics is local” but then it might not chime as well as a phrase.

There are a minority of politicians in Leinster House who focus all their energies on their constituencies with little or no engagement with national political issues. These guys could be classified as turbo-charged county councillors as their status as TDs allow them to make more headway.

Noel Grealish, the Independent TD for Galway West, is about the best example in the current Dáil. He has close to the lowest profile of any TDs in the Dáil, rarely speaks in the Dáil, and is not a member of a standing Oireachtas committee.

Like Micheal Healy Rae and Michael Lowry, he is not a member of the technical group, made up of Independents and members of small parties. In essence, Grealish’s impact in the next election will be largely judged on his local work.

As will the rest of Galway’s TDs and senators, although they have all had higher national profiles.

And none more so than the three parliamentarians who have lost the whip of their parties. The first to go was Labour’s Colm Keaveney, who crossed the Rubicon in protest at the budgetary cuts to child benefit, social welfare and the PRSI rate.

But it was clear, given his off-message public comments for months beforehand, that a casus belli (cause of war) pre-existed and Keaveney’s defection was not a question of if rather than when.

For a good while after his departure last December, Keaveney did manage to retain his role as chair of Labour, despite the obvious conflicts it entailed.

It was a position that he might not have retained after the party’s conference in the Autumn (if that is still going ahead) but for some it was seen as giving him incredible leverage, allowing him to be the authentic voice within Labour of grassroots dissent.

But modern politics is very tightly controlled and stage-managed and does not encourage any of its internal debates happening in the public’s gaze. Within a few months, Keaveney realised the influence he would bring to bear would be minimal.

Besides, in a constituency like Galway East, which is being reduced from a four-seat, to a three-seat, area, any chances he has of re-election will be improved by being free of the Labour brand.

Two Fine Gael Oireachtas members walked the plank over the abortion legislation, two of seven from a parliamentary part comprising just over 100 members.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.