Labour Party Leadership Contest

No, not in Scotland, in Ireland. Pat Rabbitte who has led the Irish Labour party for the past 8 years has resigned from the post. Rabbitte’s fate was undoubtedly tied to the electoral pact with Fine Gael. The pact didn’t get enough support to form the government and Labour were clearly squeezed in favour of the FG partners.

Rabbitte had a strong personal appeal to the Irish electorate and when the American pollster Frank Luntz was doing a series of programmes in Ireland before the election it was Rabbitte who often came out on top. Orginally elected on the Worker’s party ticket Rabbitte’s roots were in the clear left of the Irish Labour movement. The Workers party was to split some years later with the largest side becoming ‘Democratic Left’. Rabbitte was on the DL side of the split. He served as a minister in a rainbow government between FG, DL and Labour.

In 1998 DL and Labour merged after negotiation in which Rabbitte was at the forefront for DL. In 2002 he became the leader of the Labour party when Ruairi Quinn stood down.

Names have started to emerge as possible contenders for the post. Brendan Howlin was considered as a possible contender but has ruled himself out of the race. Perhaps an unsurprising move given he has stood as a contender in the previous 2 Labour leadership contests only to be defeated.

Joan Burton, Liz McManus and Tommy Broughan have all been mooted by the media but none have declared their intentions so far. Of those Liz McManus is perhaps the most credible challenger.

The only person to have declared their intention to stand is Eamon Gilmore. Like Rabbitte, and indeed McManus, Gilmore is from DL. He’s first out of the traps and probably a frontrunner at this stage – although the intentions of McManus will have a distinct influence on this. I`ve met Gilmore on a few occasions and he does have a substantial intellect. If he becomes leader his challenge is how to grow his party’s appeal. In 2002 Labour opted not to go for an electoral pact with FG and in 2007 they decided to go for one. On both occasions they have ended up outside of government.

Gilmore has indicated that at the next elections he would not be advocating a pact with another party and Labour would stand on its own merits. The key to achieving growth will be breaking the hold which Fianna Fail holds over voters from low and middle income backgrounds. If they can chime with this electorate then in the urban areas where a few extra transfers could switch a seat from FF to Labour is not unthinkable.