In a too-hot Irish economy, politicians are treating voters like children in a sweet shop

Just say no! The political party that is honest with the population and rediscovers the ability to say no might be rewarded by the adult population in a few weeks’ time. I use the word “adult” because it appears that all the main parties and senior politicians are treating the electorate like children in a sweet shop, conceding to every demand. Yes, you can have free this and free that. Vote for me, I’ll give you loads of free “lucky bags” paid for by other people.
In another world we would describe this as bad parenting. In a way, the money from American multinationals, which should make us more productive and strong, is making us juvenile and weak, rendering politics – which should be serious – worryingly immature.
This increasing infantilisation of the population means that every policy is directed towards a short-term electoral sugar rush. Saying yes is easy, but saying no is more responsible. A politician, indeed a person, who can’t say no should never be trusted because, as Napoleon famously quipped, to govern is to choose. How you choose reveals what you prioritise. Most voters who pay taxes and make choices every day, understand that the money comes from taxes and a party that says yes to everything without a coherent strategy which explains why it is saying yes, eventually needs to raise that money somewhere else.
We also understand that saying yes to everything leads to massive budget overruns, because government becomes not an exercise in judicious choice but a jamboree of excessive facilitation, where no demand is too outlandish if it promises to deliver a vote or three. This is what we saw in the recent budget and this is what we are now being subjected to on the hustings.
Infantilisation reveals what politicians think of the electorate – a passive lot ready to be bribed with their own money and, once bribed, the political class can get on with whatever they were doing before the inconvenience of an election. But while the political class might think people can be easily bribed, there is another argument that this position is peak risk for the incumbents.
We have seen all over the world this year – from the US to the UK, France and Japan – incumbents getting hammered in races that were regarded as close but became landslides for opposition parties. Just when they thought the population was inert, the sitting governments woke up to a rebellion. Who is to say the same won’t happen here in two weeks’ time? If you have been treating adults like children, what happens when free Mars Bars won’t do the trick any more?
The main issues for the Irish electorate over the past two years have been housing and immigration – both are related and both are capacity issues. In the spring 2024 Eurobarometer poll, 64 per cent of Irish people cited housing as the most important issue. Ireland’s housing crisis has reached a critical juncture, characterised by soaring property prices and an acute shortage of homes.
The Central Bank of Ireland highlights a decade-long undersupply as the root cause, necessitating the construction of 52,000 homes annually to meet demand.
Despite Government efforts to ramp up housing expenditure from €1 billion to €6.5 billion per year, property prices have surged by 150.7 per cent since their post-crisis low in 2013, now standing over 12 per cent above their previous peak. The crisis is not just about numbers; it’s impacting lives profoundly.
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Overall, Ireland saw positive net migration of +79,300 in the 12 months to April 2024 – marking the ninth consecutive year that immigration has outpaced emigration. This year, 149,200 immigrants arrived into Ireland, of which about 30,000 were returning Irish citizens. In addition, we’ve seen the number of asylum seekers more than triple in just three years. There were 14,037 applications made to August this year, exceeding the 13,277 registered in the entirety of 2023. The fact that about 35 per cent of these arrivals are single men has inflamed the feelings of some people.
While asylum seekers and “illegal immigration” have grabbed the headlines, there has been a significant growth in the number of work permits issued in recent years. Based on figures from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, 33,105 permits were issued this year – that represents a six-fold increase from the 5,495 issued on average per year over the last decade.
House prices have risen 130 per cent since early 2013, and the median property price is currently €300,000, with prices rising 10 per cent nationwide annually. There has also been a significant decline in the “stock available to rent”, with only 35,000 homes available to rent nationwide. This shortage and rise in prices and rents have hit young people the hardest, with the number of homeowners aged 25-34 dropping from 60 per cent to 27 per cent between 2013 and 2023.
From an electoral point of view, this combination of extremely high levels of house prices and rents, together with unprecedented levels of immigration, particularly asylum seekers who are here without permits, is explosive. As housing is such a huge part of everyone’s everyday expenditure, high prices and rents feed into living costs and 56 per cent of Irish voters cited rising prices and living costs as the main issue driving their voting decision in European elections – just below housing. In rural areas 68 per cent say the cost of living will be “very influential” on their vote.
Taken together, it’s not difficult to see that the economy is straining at the leash and the State’s ability, even from a managerial point of view, to deal with our capacity problem has been degraded over many years. As a result, metros can’t be built, the train infrastructure is woeful, reports are commissioned and paid for without any apparent action, and all the while impediments to building are given precedence over encouragement to build.
Rather than take responsibility for this, the Government parties appear – and don’t forget that Fine Gael has been in power for a decade-and-a-half – to have a strategy of continuing to give out the sweeties to keep everyone happy. Instead of cutting through the obstructions to development, we get a help to buy scheme here, a one-off fuel allowance there. All the while the population becomes more restless.
The Government does not need to run the economy so hot – unless it is prepared to massively increase development. If we can’t do this because the system is broken, then we must reduce immigration, set more meaningful and achievable targets and take some heat out of the economy.
This means saying no. Otherwise, prepare for some electoral surprises in the weeks ahead.