Surprisingly this isn’t Ireland that I am speaking about. Am spending a small bit of time looking at UK politics this weekend and it’s interesting to observe the similarities and the differences.
The most apparent similarity is that both countries have the opposition parties in the ascent (suppose that’s the first thing I’d mention). Both also have a prime minister who did not win office by popular mandate. There are also significant economic similarities. Both economies were over dependent on the banking sector and a housing bubble for tax revenue.
The differences are more interesting.
All of the political parties are openly committed to reducing public spending. Nick Clegg (Lib Dem leader) has just called for savage cuts in government spending. The Labour government are trying to box the Conservatives into revealing the details of their plans. This is very different to Ireland where no political party is fully committed to detail public spending plans. The reason for this difference is the uncertainty of when the Irish election will be means that no party wants to show their hand.
There also isn’t the sense of crisis that pervades Ireland at the moment. I sense that Ireland will bounce back a lot quicker with the UK still in a state of denial.