INSIDE POLITICS:The winding up of the Progressive Democrats has left many members angry and embittered, writes Mark Hennessy
THE FUNERAL has not yet taken place, the flowers have not been laid, but already politicians are pondering life after the Progressive Democrats. In truth, the party did not need a new leader last April when it appointed Senator Ciarán Cannon. It needed an undertaker.
Eventually, one appeared 10 days ago in the form of Mary Harney, who applied the humane killer that most had known for months would have to be used: the party was over. In truth, it has been thus ever since counting ended in the last general election, leaving the PDs with Harney and Noel Grealish as the party's only TDs.
However, the handling of matters since the election has been bizarre, at best - no matter what allowances are made for people wanting desperately to avoid the inevitable.
In the April leadership election, in which 1,056 members voted, Cannon beat Fiona O'Malley by 51 per cent to 49 per cent - a result which hides as much as it reveals.
Under questioning, it became clear that Cannon won because the parliamentary party - bar O'Malley, presumably - and most councillors voters for him, while the rank-and-file chose her.
Within minutes, Cannon acknowledged the difficulties facing the party, set next year's local elections as the make-or-break deadline, and promised energetic leadership.
And, frankly, Cannon then all but disappeared. He never held meetings with fellow coalition party leaders - even if they had been arranged purely for the optics.
He adopted few public positions, and when he did he failed to capitalise on them. And he made zero impact with the public, few of whom could identify him today.
The task he faced was always a Sisyphean one, and always likely to end in failure, but the distance between action and success was breathtaking. None of this is to say that Cannon, a decent, likeable man, is responsible for the Progressive Democrats' death, because he is not. However, O'Malley, who can be a bit daft on occasions, may well have made a better fist of matters having grown up in a political household.
The decision to keep the party going after the election did make some sense: Harney stayed in the Cabinet, Cannon and O'Malley got Seanad seats, but renewal was never on the cards. Today, bitterness is visible within the party's ranks. Some are angry at Cannon's performance; some with Harney for her no-notice coup de grace; some with Grealish. And some are angry with Michael McDowell for his erratic leadership, particularly during last year's election campaign itself.
McDowell simply did not believe Bertie Ahern's explanations about his personal finances and threatened he would pull out of government. However, others - dependent on FF transfers to get elected - intervened; and the party backed down and stayed inside the camp, looking foolish in the process.
And those who are angry have reason to be: Harney's interest in rejuvenating the party has been minimal, even if she is simply guilty of accepting the inevitable before others.
Grealish, meanwhile, has offered one of the most self-interested chapters seen in Irish politics, a business well-known for selfishness. The case for Grealish's defence is that he wanted to go to FF quickly, but stayed on loyally because Harney appealed to him not to leave. Few juries would believe it.
From the beginning, Grealish created doubt, saying that he was committed to the party until the local elections; yet simultaneously emphasised his attractiveness for, and links to FF. Certainly, Grealish was well entitled to make whatever decisions he wanted in his own best interests. Everybody is - in politics, or out of it. But he was not entitled to stay because he did not have the courage to leave; and yet fail to avoid doing damage to his party while he remained.
Now the political calculus has moved on to figuring out the implications of the PDs' departure, both in policy and personality terms. Mary Harney is likely to stay in Cabinet as an Independent since FF will not force her out of it, or require her to retake membership of a party she left nearly 25 years ago.
However, the clock is ticking on her political life, and the odds have shortened that she will quit in a mid-term reshuffle - perhaps for the European commissionership.
Such a move would have been more certain if Ahern had stayed on. During 10 years in power, they worked well with each other, and he owed her. Under Cowen, it is less certain, but still possible.
Noel Dempsey and Dermot Ahern are said to be interested in the Brussels job, and many in FF will wonder why they should give her anything, let alone a plum so luscious. The departure of Ahern or Dempsey would force a byelection, although FF would have a better chance in Meath of holding on to a Dáil seat than anywhere else, though far from certain.
Harney's selection would definitely mean a gain for the Opposition in the subsequent byelection, but this is a more tolerable prospect for FF than failing to hold on to one of its own seats.
In any event, Harney's candidature, should it occur, has one potential advantage for the Government as a female nomination may help as it seeks to hold on to an Irish place, and a decent portfolio at the commission.
However, the next commission may not be appointed next year at all, leaving the existing one to limp on, if the chaos caused by Ireland's Lisbon Treaty referendum rejection continues, as it undoubtedly will.
Fiona O'Malley will seek to run in Dublin South, although her early arrival will complicate matters for Fianna Fáil in a constituency that must have a byelection following the death in July of Séamus Brennan. His son Shay may seek a nomination; so, too, could Maria Corrigan, while Tom Kitt's future come the next Dáil election is not yet certain.
Nevertheless, bitter local rivalries have never bothered FF, and will not do so now.
Cannon himself is most likely bound for Fine Gael, particularly if he gets a promise that he will be able to take the place on the Galway East ticket likely to be vacated next time by Ulick Burke.
Fine Gael, in the meantime, will have to figure out what it should now do once the PDs are gone, and no longer able to chew into its voting pool, which the latter often did. So far in this Dáil term, Fine Gael has shown a drift to the right, although this has as much to do with Leo Varadkar's industry as anything else.
The vitality the Progressive Democrats enjoyed was dependent upon a distinctive policy platform that was not to everyone's taste, but then it never needed to be.
Fine Gael could attempt to build part of its platform for the next general election by promoting more radical politics, though with a wider voter catchment it has more opinions that it needs to soothe.
But for the Progressive Democrats' membership, it will be as in the beginning; formed as they were from three distinct groups, they will split three ways, with a few falling off the edge entirely.
Some of the party's support - notably a goodly share of that from in, and around Galway - was always Fianna Fáil; another section had Fine Gael sympathisers, while the third, in the words of one former senator, were "pure" PDs.
Given the tempers abroad within the ranks of the party, there is little doubt that a speedily-held party conference would descend into friction and fractiousness. However, the flowers on the grave will have wilted by the time the party's membership meets sometime towards the back end of October.