Irish Green Party having laid down with dogs, have ended up with fleas.

Above is a video of Paul Gogarty a Green Party TD (MP) speaking last week in a Dáil Éireann (Irish parliament) debate on the Social Welfare bill, responding to a quip from Labour TD Emmet Stagg, Gogarty seemed to loose all control shouting in the direction of Stagg: "Fuck you, Deputy Stagg, fuck you."


The reason for Gogarty's discomfort was clear, having just voted to support cuts of welfare benefits by an average of 4.1 per cent, while child benefit will fall by 16 per cent, Disability, widows' pensions, invalidity and carers' allowance are also to be cut by €8.20 to  €8.50 per week. Earlier in the debate FF Finance Minister Brian Lenihan also announced sweeping pay cuts for all public sector workers, including the police and teachers.


I doubt many environmentalists entered politics to carry out such a horrendous serious of welfare benefit and wage cuts, although Zak Goldsmith seems to have no problem in doing so as his support for David Cameron's UK Tory Party proves, now we can also add the Irish Green Party's Dáil Éireann parliamentarians. 


As some of us predicted at the time, if the Irish Green Party lies down with dogs, it will end up with fleas and so it has proved, when having won 6 seats at the 2007 Irish general election the Greens entered into a coalition government with Fianna Fáil.


In return for two senior and a single junior ministerial chair, the Green Party jettisoned over night its profile as a national oppositional force. Before their entry into government, the Irish Green Party raged against inequality, were vocal supporters of the Shell To Sea movement,* the campaign to reroute the M3 motorway away from the historic site of Tara and the campaign to end the use by the US military's of Shannon Airport as a stop over for its service personnel on the way to Iraq and Afghanistan. 


For Paul Gogarty and his fellow Green Party TD's to attempt dress up their betrayal as acting in the best interests of the State, highlights what some on the left always feared about the Greens. When push comes to shove these people will always fall in behind the ruling elites, and so it proved. For the State, any State, is not some neutral body that  represent the best interest of all its citizens, but the means by which powerful interest groups gain their own way, more often than not at the expense of those least able to defend themselves.

For a minority party like the Greens to enter a coalition government as a junior partner can only be viable if an agreement has been reached before hand to implement into law a number of its main manifesto commitments. Nothing can be left to doubt, all must be clear, precise and nailed down before entering governmental office. The fact the Green Party leadership failed to do this, even though some of them had experienced a political life time of dealing with Fianna Fáil, a party known for its back door deals, financial corruption and Tammany Hall shenanigans, speaks volumes as to how Paul Gogarty found himself on the floor of  Dáil Éireann cursing at a fellow TD whom he once would have seen as a potential ally, whilst those responsible for his and his party's pitiful predicament sat alongside him.


More here on Irish budget


* Press Release: Maura Harrington jailed for nine months for causing €160 damage to Shell net