Barely a week into the new year and the general election campaign is already in full swing. Fine Gael has kicked off what may be the longest campaign in Irish history with an aggressive assault on the government and, in particular Michael McDowell, the justice minister. The gloves are off, and the punches are about to come fast and furious.

In targeting Mr McDowell and what they depict as his indifference to rising rates of murder, rape and gun attacks, Fine Gael has identified crime as a government weak spot and a potential tipping point in the forthcoming campaigning. Attacks on the government’s record on health and public service waste will follow.

With five months to go to polling day, however, the opposition would be foolhardy to overplay the significance of these, or indeed any other apparently sensational issues. The escalation in underworld violence is an important but far from dominant aspect of the modern Irish story. There are other, less headline-grabbing forces at work that will have a more profound impact on our lives over coming months.

For the majority, this is an era of prosperity, but many of us are also living on the financial edge. Consumer spending has gone through the roof, as the Irish have become one of the world’s most indebted populations, evidently intoxicated by the lure of cheap and accessible credit.

Our habit of throwing money around like it’s going out of fashion has only been reinforced by the dawning realisation that a slowdown in the property market may mark the beginning of an end of an era. The construction industry has been the engine of the Irish boom, and the levelling off of prices in recent months will have negative knock-on effects elsewhere in the economy. While there is no evidence yet of a freefall in property values, the possibility of price plunges and an accompanying collapse in house-building activity remains very real, with potentially devastating results.

The prospect of at least two further interest-rate rises before the election will also dampen sentiment in a market that has become notably less bullish in the past year. Always a background preoccupation, the fate of property values is likely to become an even greater popular obsession in 2007.

While house price rises have faded, inflation seems set to become the other defining feature of the year ahead. Provisional estimates suggest our inflation rate is likely to rise from 4.4% to 6% in the short term, and a further destabilising climb cannot be ruled out.

This month there have been sizeable price hikes for gas and electricity, bus and rail fare increases, and there are higher refuse charges and motorway tolls. Coupled with the inevitable post-Christmas bills for our most recent record-breaking consumer splurge, these will undermine the feelgood factor the government has striven so assiduously to create.

Bertie Ahern has been the luckiest taoiseach in Irish history. Following the revelations about his unorthodox private financial situation, including the disclosure that a whip-round in a Manchester hotel bar was required to bail him out, the taoiseach’s poll ratings and those of Fianna Fail rose unexpectedly. Faced for the first time in a decade with the real prospect of regime change, and with lacklustre performances by the opposition leaders Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbitte, most voters appear to be ready to stick with the divil they know, for the moment at least.

As the chill winds of economic deceleration begin to bite, however, Mr Ahern’s fabled luck is about to be tested. He has been a successful fair-weather taoiseach. Does he have what it takes to retain the confidence of the nation as the lustre begins to fade from the coat of the Celtic tiger?

We are embarking on a period of considerable challenge and no little uncertainty. As the election approaches, voters will have much to contemplate. The game is on, and it’s all to play for.

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