There is still something slightly surreal about the promulgation of a programme for government by Mr Bertie Ahern and Ms Mary Harney who have yet to reveal how they will secure a working parliamentary majority when the Dail assembles next week. But the strategy and the sequence are sound. They have laid down the policy facts of life for the duration of the 28th Dail. Such independents as may support the new government will have to adapt to what the two main parties have decided and build their own agendas around those decisions.
The document presented on Thursday night is an attractive programme for the next five years. It is, by definition, largely aspirational. Many of its proposals are conditional on economic circumstances. In places it is quite precise. In others it is, perhaps necessarily, loose and uncertain.
One of the most hopeful signs for the stability of the incoming administration is the degree of evident give and take between the two parties - not withstanding Fianna Fail's preponderance in the coalition. The tax proposals go beyond Fianna Fail's original limits and are more closely reflective of the Progressive Democrats' pre-election manifesto. Other elements of the programme - such as the commitment to the pre-school sector and the proposal for private-enterprise development of prison accommodation are also of PD provenance. But it is also clear that most of the agenda which cost the PDs dear in the election has been dumped. There is no proposal to cut 25,000 jobs in the public service, no water-charges, no substantial depletion of the PRSI system, no measures on unmarried mothers.
The programme bears the marks of Mr Ahern's celebrated touch for consensus. And he has gone out of his way to make it clear that he considers himself honour-bound by his pre-election pact with the smaller party, notwithstanding its abysmal electoral performance. He is treating them with dignity and generosity. In reciprocation he and his colleagues will insist that the PDs stifle their instinct to climb to the high moral ground in their dealings with Fianna Fail. It is unlikely they will meet much resistance in that demand.
There is little that is contentious in most of the stated policy outline. The formula on the North reflects the broad bipartisanship of recent years. There are no significant alterations proposed in economic policy. The promise to continue fiscal stringency in the run-up to EMU is common-case among all parties and PD hesitations in the area are not aired. There will be a welcome for the programme's commitment in certain key areas such as agriculture and the environment. But other proposals, such as those on prisons and the institution of mandatory reporting in cases of suspected child-abuse, may cause controversy. The proposal on ethics in public life is tantalisingly vague. And just what may be involved in zero-tolerance for crime must remain to be seen.
But the success of Mr Ahern's government will depend more upon his own leadership than on anything written down in the Action Programme for the new Millennium. He has difficult choices to make in putting a Cabinet together. It will be revealing to see how he balances between the old guard and the new blood of the party - between those who reflect some of the less salubrious traditions of Fianna Fail and those who represent a fresh start. Until we have names on portfolios, the style and character of Mr Ahern's first Government can only be guessed at.