Fresh from a By-Election win, Simon Harris is riding high. Here's why viable challengers to his crown don't exist. And why all he needs to beware of is the cautionary tale of Micheál Martin...

Published: 01:10, 22 June 2026 | Updated: 01:10, 22 June 2026 If nothing else, the uneasy rotating Taoiseach concept has given us a fabulous new fluctuating game between the two leaders who share the gig at the top of the Grand Coalition.  See how the contrasting fortunes of the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have flipped in a year? In the days after the 2025 formation of the new Grand Coalition, the future of Taoiseach Micheál Martin appeared assured.  At that time his younger rival/Coalition partner Simon Harris seemed to have the more formidable challenges ahead. Mr Martin, at the height of his powers, with Mr Harris on the opening day of the 34th Dáil When he first took over, Fine Gael gained an unexpected ‘Harris Hop’ in the local and European elections. But he was outwitted by Martin in the general election of late 2024.  The Fianna Fáil leader went after a weakness, then-justice minister Helen McEntee, in a interview with the Irish Mail on Sunday. Harris made mistakes, brought about by inexperience in the position of party leader. As such, we told you here at the beginning of February 2025 that ‘Harris lost out in the election within an election with Micheál Martin’ and that meant that ‘Harris looks ahead now to three hard years’.  We remind you of that not to admit we were wrong, but to remind our readers that political coverage rests on current facts. At the beginning of 2025 things were stacked against the junior partner. We pointed out that, unusually, the position of FG party leader now came with a significant bonus.  Automatically you would become Tánaiste, but you would also have a clear path to an extended stay in the Taoiseach’s office without having the slings and arrows of an election. The reality, we pointed out at the time, is that a putative challenger such as Jennifer Carroll MacNeill might be able to use the unique selling point of being Ireland’s first female Taoiseach to persuade skittish FG TDs, fresh from Harris’s underwhelming performance on the campaign trail, to elevate her. We later warned that the presidential election would prove pivotal for both the FF and FG leaders. In that we have been proven half-correct. Ordinarily it would be hard to explain why Harris dodged internal retribution for appointing the substandard candidate Heather Humphreys for the presidency. Yet, showing that luck is another essential for a leader, Harris’s Coalition partners manufactured the most farcical, disastrous presidential election in history.  Such was the extent of the disaster for Micheál Martin, that FG’s Heather Humphreys finishing the campaign was enough to allow Harris keep his head down, as the toxic fallout from Jim Gavin’s abortive tilt at the Áras threatened to overwhelm his FF counterpart. Even so, the outlook for the man dubbed the TikTok Taoiseach looked inconclusive. There were inchoate rumblings on poor poll ratings. Fine Gael has traditionally been a party that placed huge stock in poll ratings. But Harris has effectively been assisted by the sheer dysfunction of his rival in Government. FF has made a large number of mistakes in this Coalition’s term of office – and more recently Martin’s obliterated political authority has hampered any attempt to correct course.  The handling of key issues such as the EU Mercosur trade deal and the fuel protests was a symptom of a greater malaise. A party unhappy with its leader, but which refuses to remove him, can hardly be expected to persuade the electorate to back its agenda. In contrast Harris, after a stunning victory for his candidate Seán Kyne in Galway West, has secured his leadership. Victorious by-election candidate Seán Kyne, centre, with Peter Burke, left, and Simon Harris And he did so by learning lessons from his 2024 campaign mistakes. The Harris on the hustings out west was more relaxed and more present.  Now he can look forward to assuming the office of Taoiseach in 2027, without the insecurity that stalked him last year. The rotating Taoiseach arrangement is still relatively new for the Irish political system but, if you’re the second in charge, the only game is to make sure you are there to take over when the baton change comes. He is remarkably well assisted by circumstance too. In contrast to Martin, there is no natural successor, or even a challenger, to Harris. (Martin nearly has more challengers than he has months left in the job.)  ‘But what about Jennifer Carroll MacNeill?’, I hear some readers protest. But that prospect is no longer founded in reality. She remains an impressive media performer and has gained credit for staring down the consultants in the Rotunda row.  But I feel the usual disasters lie ahead for her at the Department of Health. She has lost the irascible but extremely able Robert Watt as secretary-general, and watch as all the headline figures start to go the wrong way there. Ultimately gender is the primary reason for any current momentum behind Carroll MacNeill. Many would like to see something happen, and predict it happening because it is the right, or on-trend, thing. Since neither of the larger parties – Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael – has ever had a woman leader, many work on the assumption that it has to happen. But politics is about numbers, not sentiment. And with the against-the-odds by-election win, Harris has reasserted that crucial ability that successful political leaders all have – electability. Harris’s supporters are talking up the chances of Peter Burke, the Enterprise Minister. My experience with senior politicians tells me that when their camp is talking up the future chances of a certain successor, you can safely put them in the ‘Absolutely No Threat Whatsoever’ category. Helen McEntee’s continued presence in Cabinet is down to her experience, her party support in Meath and a lack of adequate replacements in the party. Since McEntee didn’t put her name forward in 2024 to succeed Leo Varadkar – and many said she was his preferred successor at one point – she’s reached her limit. Martin Heydon is mentioned in dispatches – but by traditional, conservative Fine Gaelers who pine for the olden, golden days. Of the other FG Cabinet ministers, we have the erratic Patrick O’Donovan and ‘anonymous’ Hildegarde Naughton.  Neither is a viable successor – to unseat Harris you would need to be more than viable. Harris is, from my long observation, a ruthless political operator. And a master of some of the darkest of dark political arts. He is almost certain to have a good two-year run at the office of Taoiseach from 2027. And if he can leverage that office to differentiate his party effectively from FF, he can dream of seeking a fresh mandate. By 2029, FG will have been in power for nearly 19 years straight. FF was in Government for nearly a quarter of a century, between 1957 and 1981, but as we have shown above, times have changed. Perhaps (and whisper this) not only with FF. Since the 2024 general election, FF has had the whip hand in that its coalition options were considered more plentiful. It could stay with Fine Gael or flirt with Sinn Féin. It could even bat its eyelashes at the SocDems. But now Fine Gael too can dream of something other than the Grand Coalition. If the SocDems’ rise continues, if Labour holds its own, could a Rainbow Coalition 2.0 be in the offing?  That might sound far‑fetched. But even the faintest hint of that scenario shows how much has changed since the by-election win. Mr Martin, pictured in Brussels this weekend, has all the hallmarks of a late-stage Taoiseach In contrast, Martin has all the hallmarks of late-stage Taoiseach. The end is coming and everyone knows it.  Scornful successors jockey for position. In two weeks, Ireland assumes the Presidency of the EU. This will be his swansong. And this perhaps is the one caveat that Harris should take heed of.  This time last year Martin’s leadership looked unassailable, leading him to hubristically entertain overtures that led to the selection of Jim Gavin as his standard-bearer.  The lesson? In politics it’s best to take each week, each year, as it comes. Sorry we are not currently accepting comments on this article.