The tanaiste's purpose was to scare voters over the prospect of a left-wing government, but his stunt fell as flat as previous efforts to warn people about left-wing parties in power.

Suspicion of the left is not new in Irish politics. On the eve of Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left reaching their 'Triple Entente' on 14 December 1994, there was widespread fear that a left-leaning government was going to bring the economy to its knees.

The lead story in the Irish Press that day warned: "Around �200m worth of government bonds have been sold in the past few days by foreign investors worried about the left-wing influence on a new Rainbow Coalition.

"The investors' worry is that the strong left-of-centre element in the new government will undermine the financial discipline shown by successive Irish administrations since 1987.

"They fear that Democratic Left and Labour will insist on high public spending, leading to high budget deficits which would undermine the value of government bonds on the international market."

The National Treasury Management Agency was forced to move in and buy up bonds in a bid to stabilise their price and save the Celtic Tiger from a stillbirth.

Not that they need have bothered:

the government was the very model of responsibility and laid the groundwork for the economic boom.

Democratic Left originated after a 1992 split from the Workers' Party and was originally called New Agenda. Ironically, the party was just as suspicious of the right before the 1994 government was formed.

Ruling out participation in any government not dominated by leftwing parties in November 1992, leader Proinsias de Rossa famously said, "We will not act as a crutch for conservative parties in decline".

De Rossa made that statement three days before Labour party leader Dick Spring denounced any idea of his party going into coalition with Fianna Fail.

Spring said, "Given these [failings] it must surely be considered amazing that any party would consider coalescing with [Fianna Fail]f We will not support any government with the track record of this one."

Spring made that infamous statement in a debate of no confidence in the Fianna Fail-led coalition on 5 November 1992. The general election was on 25 November, and even though Spring campaigned heavily against Fianna Fail and Albert Reynolds, he was appointed tanaiste in a Reynoldsled government in January 1993.