More moves in the left

I saw this article today in the Fingal Independent about how the Socialist Party (SP) have gone in to coalition in Fingal County Council (FCC) with the Labour Party (Lab). Given the history of the SP (they grew from a split in the Labour party between Trotskyist and 'mainstream' factions) I was a little surprised to read of this coalition. Many people doubted whether the left could ever work together, is this the start of increased co-operation? It's quite interesting to contrast this SP/Lab coalition on Fingal County Council with the Fine Gael/Lab coalition in Dublin City Council.

Also, in the same issue of the Fingal Independent, I saw that Fine Gael councillors tried to block Joe Higgins MEP from speaking at the first meeting of the new FCC (see article here) as he is now both a County Councillor and MEP, and has two mandates. Let us not forget that the man was a TD and effectively the leader of the SP. Joe Higgins replied to the criticism by saying that the Fine Gael councillors; 'should have taken their Milk of Magnesia' before attending the meeting.

Now that's why Joe got my vote.