Leo Varadkar has had a very succesful political career to date. Youngest ever Fine Gael leader. Youngest ever Taoiseach. When he first took up the role of Taoiseach his being gay made him *the* poster boy for progressive Ireland - although the bloom has gone off the rose a bit lately. His ascent to the top tells us a lot about how we are today but one lesson is almost completely overlooked.
Leo Varadkar's political career shows the limits there are on how well you can do in Irish politics if you hold centre right views. And is a further illustration of what you need to do if you want to go beyond those limits - to the point of having to hide what you believe in. In the end it was easier for Varadkar to come out as gay than as a conservative.
Varadkar's record tells us a lot about the climate here for centre right ideas in general. It's not enough for aspiring rightists to win over the public (check), it's not even enough for them to offer a sympathetic public some serious political groupings to vote for (definitely uncheck), at the end of all that any aspiring rightists will still have to deal with how difficult the powers that be are going to make things for them. They'll be up against the same government, permanent government, non government and media monolith that Varadkar came up against as an Irish early adopter of modern centre right ideas.
The Leo from that video in the George is right wing? Really?
Which of our leading politicians:
joined Fine Gael in UCD, his closest ally in young FG was Lucinda Creighton (subsequently kicked out of FG over abortion and founded Renua)
just prior to the gay marriage referendum said every child needed a father and a mother
said migrants from Albania and Georgia with fake documents were behind a rise in the numbers seeking asylum in the country.
wanted the HSE to split up hospital covid numbers and report how many in hospital with covid were actually admitted for something else.
took on the Greens over the turf ban - said asking the Irish to give up turf was like asking the french to give up wine or the Italians to stop eating pasta.
and the giveaway - showed up on Palm Sunday last year for Latin Mass in Harrington Street.
Who was it? If you guessed the ghost of Oliver J. Flanagan you'd be wrong. It was our boy Leo.
He seems like someone who is instinctually conservative - seems like he might have read National Review or the Spectator as a teenager - but found you can't succeed in Irish politics that way. So all we've got throughout his career are glimmers of what he believes in.
“A fair and firm and hard approach to migration”
Varadkar resumed the role of Taoiseach last Christmas and within weeks he was talking about the need for "more appropriate and robust border controls", "the Govt needed to take a fair and firm and hard approach to migration", "centre ground need to be willing to talk about migration" and "there is a need for controls"
He's promised on a number of occasions that immigration rules will be applied more strictly and that deportation orders will be followed up on. Without much sign of it happening it's true. Still it would be hard to imagine Micheal Martin having made those statements as Taoiseach or calling for them now.
What you’re up against
So with the Taoiseach saying he's for it why are the rules on immigration not being implemented.
They're not being implemented for reasons that are a microcosm of all the things that have held Varadkar back from being able to express his conservatism throughout his career.
Our left leaning instutions reward their own.
In the immigration case their own is currently Simon Harris.
Not only is it difficult for Varadkar to take on those institutions, if he does he presents his rivals with opportunities. As soon as Varadkar says something on immigration Harris is out signalling to NGOs, media and potential leadership backers that he, Simon Harris, is on message and their champion.
Added to which, responsibility for implementing the immigration rules lies with the Department of Justice currently under Vardakar's main challenger, underminer and backstabber in chief.
The Dail is a political monolith. There might as well be only one party.
The monolith is pro immigration and Varadkar is in coalition with this monolith. There are a limited amount of things he has power over and a very reduced number of ministerial positions under his control.
It's doubtful whether any Taoiseach has ever had as little authority over his cabinet as Varadkar.
(And sapping authority even further there's that George video. Undermining? In my eyes yes but I don't even pretend to understand the Irish public since Gay Marriage and Repeal.)
We have a media monoculture to an extent that is probably unique among western democracies.
That monoculture can't even have an honest discussion of centre right views on immigration. It rejects them simply at the level of being bad manners.
As far as cracking down on immigration goes you couldn’t say our una voce media are against the idea it's more they simply can't comprehend that someone could seriously be for it.
When things are like this it's almost a fools errand for some one on the right to try to connect with the public.
Varadkar contra mundum. In theory the most powerful man in the country. In fact a good illustration that there are much more powerful political forces determining things. Forces that will have to be dealt with by anyone on the right looking to effect change.
This is the situation that Varadkar has dealt with throughout his career. But we are living in different times. We have an immigration policy managed by Basil Fawlty. This Tijauna donkey show of a screw up that we’re living through is building pressure that may be about to shift the tectonic plates.
We’ve seen the change in what people have the courage to say about immigration that is the legacy of the East Wall protests. There's been the change in mainstream coverage of anti immigration views that's happened in the last two weeks and is tied to Inch. Then there's the earthquake that is today's SBP poll: 75% of people think we’ve taken in too many immigrants.
*If* this persists - a big if - then cracks might just start to appear in the monolith:
Opinion makers - not a Michael McDowell something more like feature writers in the Indo, radio talk show hosts - start looking for immigration rules to be enforced... "as the Taoiseach himself has said"...
Pesenting a voter unhappy about immigration with both an "acceptable" solution and someone associated with that solution.
Leading to an FG bounce in the polls? Given the negativity surrounding everything else to do with Leo's government if that boost came it'd be clear where it was coming from.
That would give backbenchers a different perspective. FG parliamentary party meetings are live tweeted now so we'd get to see them stop blaming Varadkar's leadership for the problems of immigration and start seeing immigration policy itself as the problem and Leo as having the answers. Rise and follow Leo.
75% of the population want a pause on immigration but there's currently no one they take seriously that they can vote for. FG would be pushing on an open door.
We can dream.