Labour Youth has overwhelmingly rejected the party leader's electoral strategy.
At its annual conference in the Mansion House, Dublin, at the weekend, the majority of delegates backed a motion opposing any "rigid pre-electoral pact or voting arrangement" which would compromise the party's core values.
The vote is another indication of divergence on the preferred option of party leader Mr Pat Rabbitte of seeking a pre-election pact with Fine Gael.
Mr Rabbitte, who was in Waterford while the issue was debated but who addressed the conference on Saturday evening, said: "I'd have been very disappointed if the delegates didn't take a radical view. I accept that there can be two views and always have been about electoral strategy. It has been a perennial problem for Labour."
Before he addressed 100 Labour Youth members, Mr Rabbitte said there were at least 18 months to go to the election and "in the meantime I will lead as I have indicated".
He told the conference it was his objective to remove "this most unsocialist of governments" from office.
"To do that, I am convinced that we must present the Irish people with an alternative at the next general election and to have that Government returned to office. If we have two years left to that battle being joined, I hope in that time to persuade you of the merits of this strategy."
In the 1970s coalition may have been an issue, but "there really isn't any market for that" now and the party should not "take an each-way bet".
He also said he had had no meetings with Fine Gael since the Mullingar agreement and suggested it was better to go into election with a policy "finessed", rather than to wait until afterwards when there would be little time and too much pressure.
A Fine Gael spokesman said yesterday the vote was a matter for Labour Youth. "Pat Rabbitte has stated his strategy and he is the leader of the Labour Party."
The conference motion stated that Labour's progressive policies represented a "direct challenge to the neo-liberal policies of Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats" and it called on the party to play a leading role in opposing parties of the right at every level of Government.
The vote on an amendment from Mr Rabbitte's Dublin South West constituency was closer. It called for the party to rule out coalition with Fianna Fáil and the PDs and added that "while Labour Youth remains open to a Labour/FG vote-transfer pact, it is totally opposed to a Labour/FG pre-election policy pact".
It would fight the general election on an independent policy platform "in direct opposition to Fine Gael's policy agenda, where necessary".
The amendment's proposer said the party had three options - to seek coalition with Fianna Fáil, to seek coalition with Fine Gael or to tell them both to "get stuffed".
One speaker said Labour should fight the election as an independent party and then "we would see what we could get from those blueshirts, they are so bloodthirsty for power". Another said: "Unfortunately a huge majority are voting for right-wing parties" and "at some stage we will have to go in with them".
