Leo and how to grab a headline

I spent much of yesterday in the car, travelling to a funeral in Mayo. As a result I got to listen to a lot of radio, considerable chunks of which was sound sludge. However, I did catch one interview that was worthwhile. It was on Newstalk , where Pat Kenny interviewed   Eoin O Broin, the Sinn Féin TD for Dublin Mid-West.

Leo Varadkar is Fine Gael’s Minister for Social Protection. O Broin was on Newstalk responding to Varadkar’s campaign “Welfare Cheats Cheat Us All”, which, pretty obviously, is aiming to end or diminish the number of people claiming welfare who shouldn’t be Last year, Leo claimed, welfare cheats cost the public purse in the south €500 million last year.

O Broin begged to differ. He said that the figures for welfare fraud last year were €48 million and the year before €41 million.

So how did Varadkar come up with his claim of €500 million? Because the Minister took not only the money people had got fraudulently in welfare payments but projected that to the end of the year. He did this on the basis that the money would have been secured illegally if the fraud had not happened – except he forget to tell anybody.

If he had come clean, Varadkar would have had a case. If a guy is claiming benefits illegally, he’ll probably go on doing that if not caught and stopped.

But  as Ó Broin pointed out, Leo did not come clean. Instead he trumpeted the mythical €500 million welfare fraud figure as fact, ignoring the actual figure of €48 million. .

O Broin also questioned Varadkar’s  €200,000 fraud campaign. Getting people to tell on their neighbours who are cheating is one way of stopping the fraud,  but apparently Varadkar didn’t bother to check if it was the best way. The money might have been spent on hiring more benefits inspectors, or people hired to check and correct errors in payments.  But Leo figures getting people to tell on their neigbhours is the best way, and he put €200,000 into it without checking if it was.

In short, O Broin charged Varadkar with two things: (i) Using public money on a campaign that might or might not help stop benefits fraud; and (ii) Claiming that €500 million of welfare fraud had taken place when in fact just €48 million had taken place.

Why did Leo indulge in this…let me get a polite word …campaign of disinformation? For the same reason, bizarrely, as Simon Coveney attended Martin McGuinness’s funeral. Both men are running to succeed the wobbly Enda as leader of Fine Gael, and both thought this would be a headlines-grabbing way to do it.

The difference is that, while Coveney probably got a mention in the papers, Varadkar got the headlines for his move. I’m tough guy Leo and I’m going to hunt down these welfare cheats that are costing us €500 million a year. The sad thing is that this, um, untruth will be what people remember, while they’ll forget what exactly that O Broin guy was saying.

Look behind you, Leo. No, it’s not that Simon is creeping up on you with a baseball bat. It’s the fact that your pants are on fire.