There are two schools of thought within Fianna Fáil about the future leadership of Micheál Martin. Questioned about the possibility of moves to unseat him after he steps down as Taoiseach, one veteran TD says: “There is no appetite, no contender, no contest. Whatever challenge was there is gone now. The suitors for the job either don’t have the appetite or the balls.”
The second school of thought is that leadership hopefuls are merely waiting in the wings until they know they have the numbers. It is just a matter of when, not if.
Regardless of which camp they are in, all agree that Martin’s choice of ministry in this weekend’s re-shuffle will speak volumes.
One senior TD, speaking privately, said: “If he decides to go for the Department of Foreign Affairs and play the world statesman, well that is no good to the party. People want someone there who is closer to the ground day in, day out. In the long term, when it comes to planning for the local elections and EU elections, all of these things will come into play. If he goes for Higher Education or the Department of Enterprise that is a signal that he intends to spend most of his time in Ireland. It is in his hands.”
That Martin has reached the rotation of taoiseach effectively holding the keys to his own destiny is even more remarkable given only last year there were whisperings that numbers for a heave were nearly there. Then his fate was predicated on the Covid-19 vaccination roll-out.
The vaccination programme was considered an overall success, and Martin settled into the role of Taoiseach, quelling much of the unrest. Despite ever-present grumblings agitators are holding their fire. For now.
The names most often mentioned as leadership contenders are: Dublin Bay South TD Jim O’Callaghan; Minister for Public Expenditure Michael McGrath; the outgoing Chief Whip Jack Chambers; Minister for Education Norma Foley; Mayo TD Dara Calleary; Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien; and Laois-Offaly TD Barry Cowen.
As far back as January 2021, Cowen was suggesting Martin would not lead Fianna Fáil into the next election, telling the Sunday Independent at the time “nobody has a free pass”.
Following the party’s disastrous Dublin Bay South 2021 byelection result Cowen called for a special Fianna Fáil meeting, saying its performance had been “alarming” but also “not hugely surprising”, while pointing out that the party was then still waiting for the review of its “dismal” general election.
There was no immediate meeting but a two-day think-in in Co Cavan the following September became something of a “clear-the-air” meeting, with rumblings about Martin’s leadership greatly diminished after that.
This week, Cowen, asked if he thinks Martin should go before the next election, said “that’ll be for another day”. This weekend’s mid-term changeover was a “momentous and historical occasion”, adding that the Coalition “is the better for Fianna Fáil’s place in it”, and that Martin has “led the government well”.
He shares, however, the concerns of others about Martin going to Foreign Affairs. Combining the role of party leader with Foreign Affairs would be “a tall order”, he said, suggesting that a new deputy leader should be appointed.
He said opinion polls show that Fianna Fáil is “not well positioned today” for a quickly-held general election, adding that it needs to speed up the creation of new and distinct policies on “the major issues that most matter to the public”, such as housing, childcare, health, climate and energy, rural life and Irish unity.
Efforts on housing, including record spending and attempts to boost affordable housing numbers, were “still not winning in the public’s mind”, while planning reforms must go far enough to deal with a “time of emergency and crisis”.
Cowen is not the only one in the party who fears Fianna Fáil will not get a poll bounce from Government successes. Credit today is spread across three parties, not one, as was previously the case. “(It) no longer guaranteed to translate into support for Fianna Fáil,” one figure said this week.
Carlow-Kilkenny TD John McGuinness – a long-time critic of Martin – said as recently as July that Martin should step down as leader in December’s changeover, saying it would be “natural timing”. While he had “done very well” as Taoiseach on the Covid-19 pandemic and Ukraine “no one stays in position forever”.
Interestingly, McGuinness was silent on the subject of Martin’s leadership this week. On the other hand, some TDs in the party appear to have experienced a change of heart about Martin’s leadership.
Immediate after the Dublin Bay South by-election debacle, where FF’s candidate Deirdre Conroy got less than 5 per cent of the vote, Clare TD Cathal Crowe said Martin was doing a good job during Covid but it was his “honest belief” that FF should have a new leader by the next general election. Nearly 18 months on, Crowe now says: “In all likelihood he will lead us into the next election.”
Saying Martin’s future will be a “personal decision” for him, he said he done “an exceptionally good job” in the “toughest of circumstances” on Covid, the Ukraine war and the energy and cost-of-living crisis.
Reports in some media outlets that a handful of Fianna Fáil TDs would not vote for Leo Varadkar as taoiseach unless Martin laid out his future plans have failed to materialise, but that does not mean the team around Martin should be lax about a future backbench uprising.
In July a group of 30 Fianna Fáil TDs and Senators met for “a conversation” about backbench concerns, organised by Cork North Central TD Padraig O’Sullivan. The fact that so many turned up piqued plenty of interest, including from Martin, who was on his way to Ukraine when it happened.
While the leadership was not mentioned specifically, some present said they felt it was the elephant in the room. This group will meet again in the new year. Around 15 party members have now put their concerns in writing to O’Sullivan.
Supplied with fresh emails, O’Sullivan now intends to prepare a dossier of the collected thoughts in the new year. Though the new emails do not raise qualms with Martin’s leadership, but they do raise concerns about a sense of detachment in the party and the formulation of policies.
One senior party TD said that the pressure would be on Martin to put more focus into strengthening the Fianna Fáil brand now that he was no longer in the all-consuming role of taoiseach. For his part, when leadership questions have been asked of him Martin has largely brushed them off.
His long-term plan might not be a mystery, though. He has been tipped as Ireland’s next EU commissioner in 2024. A stint in Foreign Affairs would be a useful segue way for that. But it will be Fianna Fáil that nominates Ireland’s next commissioner – a post commanding prestige and €268,000, plus expenses. Martin, however, would probably need still to be leader to pitch himself for that. A managed exit would avoid a destabilising and acrimonious heave, but one senior figure does not buy the idea that Martin can keep his plans under wraps until 2024.
“This needs to be discussed within Fianna Fáil and announced in advance. He would get a very good posting. But if it is not announced, it will drift. One thing he can’t do is run away three or four months before an election.
“Now that Micheál has become Tánaiste, and because we are in the second half of this Government’s term, Fianna Fáil should now start focusing on the next election. We need to have an honest appreciation of where we are at in the polls. People were very anxious to ensure that Micheál got his term as Taoiseach and we wanted him to do well. But at some stage we have to talk about the future. And it is unlikely that he will lead us into the next election,” the party source said.
However, Martin may really want to be taoiseach again. While sections of his own may question him, he remains fairly popular with the public, with October’s Irish Times/Ipsos poll after a well-received budget giving him a 45 per cent approval rating, tied with Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald and one point ahead of Fine Gael’s Varadkar.
Should Martin remain leader – as he intends to – for the local and European elections in May 2024, Fianna Fáil’s performance then could decide whether or not he stays in place or whether to turn his eyes to Brussels.
The option of a managed exit may sound feasible and perhaps even attractive to some, but 2024 is, politically speaking, a long time away. As Robert Burns wrote in his 1785 poem To A Mouse: “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry”.
