The Rubik Cube way of forming a government

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

A month after the election, we have not extricated ourselves from the gloop of the polling results just yet. It’s unlikely we will be free of all that stickiness until well after the next vote for Taoiseach on April 6.

It’s a bit like a Rubik’s Cube. Matching the colours on one side depends on matching the colours on all sides. It’s tricky. It’s going to require every side involved in a deal even if they are abstaining (including the other big party) locking themselves in to government survival for at least a year, and possibly two.

My instinct from the start has been that it’s going to be a Fine Gael minority government. The number of others required by Fianna Fáil to secure some kind of consensus is just too high. When thinking of the administration that will be formed, the verb ‘to totter’ is the one that comes most readily to mind.

I have also thought it will be mid-April at the earliest that the deal will be done. Nothing has happened so far to make me alter that view.

Fine Gael need only six additional TDs to get over the minimum threshold required, although in practice it will need more. Even though the party will still be well short of a majority, its numbers will force Fianna Fáil to – at the very least – abstain for the key votes in the 32nd Dáil.

Denis Naughten was out at the weekend with some very sensible analysis of the frustrations involved. Both of the big parties are going at it hammer and tongs, trying to woo the uncommitted Independents and smaller parties. But there’s no point in either Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil cobbling together the numbers without talking to each other.

Because no matter how many they take on board, they will still need the auld enemy’s support in some form, even if it is abstention on key votes. And if the other side vote against the Government on a whim, or during the first No Confidence motion, the whole thing will come toppling down.

The Opposition – Sinn Féin and the AAAPBP – will exploit every opportunity to force the issue and try to embarrass those supporting unpopular government stances.

It will be difficult. And of course, the sequencing is a bit tricky. If Fine Gael brokers a deal with Independents and smaller parties, it will then have to go and seek some kind of imprimatur from Fianna Fáil to prevent it bringing down the government at the first opportunity.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.