The Labour party has ruled itself out of government formation talks with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil on Friday, blaming “a policy gulf” and different visions for Ireland.
The parliamentary party held a meeting on Thursday afternoon during which the decision was put forward and agreed.
“I was updating colleagues at that meeting on the engagements we’ve had with both Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil in recent weeks and I do want to acknowledge we’ve had engagements, it’s been very useful,” she said at Leinster House.
“However as I indicated to the parliamentary party today, following the engagements we’ve had, I’ve formed the assessment that it is not possible to for us to enter any negotiations on government formation.”
Ms Bacik said that she called the leaders of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, Simon Harris and Micheál Martin, to tell them of her decision before announcing it to the media.
Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil – the two main coalition partners in the last government – are expected to re-enter government together and replace the Greens for a group of independents as its junior partners.
This gained momentum when the Regional Group TD Verona Murphy was backed by Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil to become the next Ceann Comhairle when the Dail returned on Wednesday.
Government formation talks are expected to continue in the coming days before breaking for the Christmas period and resuming in early January.
Ms Bacik said that the next government would be of the “status quo” and not “a government for change that we stood for and we want to see”, and said Labour would build on its ambitions in opposition.
Asked why the decision to rule out government was not made two weeks ago, she said the party did not want to walk away from talks without “exploring whether it would be possible to see a way to implement our policies”.
She said the party had “genuinely constructive” engagement with the two big parties.
“But of course the numbers were always going to make it difficult for us, or any smaller party, going in with the bigger two to have the leverage to deliver on the policies that our communities need. That was always there, it was evident to everyone I think.”
She said among the obstacles to forming a government were Labour’s call for a State construction company, which Ms Bacik said Fianna Fail raised concerns with, and with a public childcare system, to which she said there was “reluctance to engage on that”.
Louth TD Ged Nash said that a term that was used again by members of Labour’s parliamentary party was “this appears to be a government of the status quo”.
“What we would have been disappointed with, as a party, is if we hadn’t exhausted the process, and that’s what our discussions last week were about, ensuring we enter the process to establish if there was, in fact, at all a basis for engaging in formal negotiations… that has proven not to be the case.
“It is a position that the entire parliamentary party is unanimous on.”
Meanwhile, Simon Harris declined to say what ministry he is in line for in the next government.
The Fine Gael leader, who is in Brussels for a meeting being attended by his EU counterparts and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, was asked whether he will return to government as minister for Foreign Affairs.
“I just can’t answer that yet, because I read lots of speculation in lots of newspapers about which individual Fine Gael politician may take up which ministry,” he said.
“I have to tell you, much to the disappointment of those who engage in the speculation, all of our priority at the moment is on the policy platform. I’m in politics long enough, and I’m in government long enough to know now what goes into the programme for government really matters.
“There is very substantial talks under way between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil in relation to what we can deliver in the next five years.”
He said he has had good engagements with Labour, the Social Democrats and the Regional Group of independents.
“I want to be in a position to form the government in the month of January. I’ve already outlined the kind of principles that need to underpin that government, mutual respect, respect for the mandates that parties received, including my own, where 458,000 people went out and gave us their number one vote, hundreds of thousands more people gave us second and third preferences, and we increased our seats in Dáil Éireann.
“We want to play a leadership role in the government. We’ve worked well with Fianna Fáil, and I believe it is possible for Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil to put together, with others, a stable government that can deliver five budgets.
“So five budgets, mutual respect, stability, agreed policy platform. They’re all the priorities, and anything else is for another day.
“But, I do hope we can do this in the month of January. There’s a lot of uncertainty in the world, there’s a need to get it right, absolutely, and it needs to take the time it needs to take.
“We need to go through our own processes then, in terms of consulting and balloting members but also, I don’t think people want too much navel gazing either.
“The people have voted, and they expect politicians to get on with it in terms of forming a government and that’s certainly what we intend to do.”
