Country cries out for real leadership

Ireland's foray into the debt markets this week has been successful in raising €1.5 billion of fresh borrowings, but it has come at a price to the taxpayer. We have ended up paying over six per cent for government debt on this occasion compared to five per cent paid at the last bond auction in June. Ireland needs to borrow as much as €55 million each week just so the State can pay its teachers and Gardai and other public service employees. Any household that needs to continually borrow for its day-to-day necessities knows that this is not sustainable over the long term and the consequences of amassing such a big debt pile will eventually have a not terribly happy ending. We are now having to pay up to 6.5 per cent for our borrowings, up from 5.8 per cent a week ago, a huge increase that says a lot about how the international debt markets feel about Ireland and its ability to repay its debts right now. The markets have been especially hostile to Ireland in recent weeks although many commentators and economists here have said such nervousness is unfounded and exaggerated. Notwithstanding this, it is the small economies of Ireland and Portugal which lie most exposed to the vagaries of the international speculators now as they sense the vulnerability of both countries, particularly in our case over the massive losses at nationalised Anglo Irish Bank. The Government of Brian Cowen, which needs to have a firm hand on the tiller at this crucial juncture in our history, has found itself distracted over the past week by the embarrassment of its leader's now infamous early morning radio interview in which he appeared to be the worse for wear after staying up till 3.30am in the bar at the hotel where the Fianna Fail party was having its annual 'think-in'. Despite political rumblings about his future as Taoiseach, he has signalled his determination to stay on, to the dismay of many in the country. Mr Cowen's decision to go on live national radio at that hour after a late night was regarded as a particularly bad judgement call on his part. Quite what the rest of the world made of it was clear in the newspaper headlines from Washington to Warsaw. From an international perspective, Ireland needed this like a really bad hangover. Ireland's image has been tainted enormously over the past two years by the damage wrought by rogue bankers and the country's continuing fiscal instability following the property and construction bubble bursting. While he has put up a united front so far with Finance Minister Brian Lenihan by his side, saying the Cabinet is united behind him and getting on with the job at hand, there appears to be no such unity among some Fianna Fail backbenchers who see FF's poll ratings at historic lows and who know many of them are in danger of losing their seats at the next general election unless things change. Further signs of disenchantment will only grow if new opinion polls due out next week show FF and Mr Cowen have lost further ground. The damage inflicted on this deeply unpopular Government from within was enunciated by former minister of state Tom Kitt who said he believed it was time to discuss the leadership as "heads are down a bit and we do need to do something about it". The most obvious candidate for role of Taoiseach would be Mr Lenihan who has been largely credited with whatever success this Government has had in tackling head-on the country's economic difficulties, certainly on the international stage. He is popular and respected and in interviews always appears to at least give earnest answers to questions rather than the by now hackneyed platitudes delivered frequently by Mr Cowen about "getting on with the job of Government" while being light on any specifics. Mr Lenihan's remarkable fortitude in the face of his serious health issue has only increased his standing among people but his cancer diagnosis would have to be a major consideration for the party were he to be the anointed one. A clean bill of health, which the country must hope he gets, would undoubtedly clear the way for him. One way or the other, Brian Cowen has now lost the credibility he needs to continue as leader of the country as the mounting losses from the banking bust threaten to enslave this and the next generation of Irish people, making any significant economic recovery appear unlikely. Now is the time for true leadership, not the ersatz style of authority we have become used to in recent times.