One leader’s forgotten milestone serves to mark his rival’s virtues

LAST week was the 30th anniversary of Charlie Haughey’s election as Taoiseach for the first time, but the occasion seemed to pass without notice in the media. Maybe it is a measure of how low he has descended in the eyes of the public. Although he had always been acutely conscious of carving out a place in history for himself, it seems his reputation is now in tatters.

Haughey was the poor boy who made it to the top the hard way. Even though he married the daughter of Seán Lemass, he had to stand for election four times before he made it into the Dáil.

Garret FitzGerald, on the other hand, was from a privileged background as the son of a cabinet minister. He breezed into the Seanad and later into the Dáil with little difficulty.

In the coming years Haughey seemed to win all the political battles with FitzGerald, but ultimately the latter won the war because he had a vision for the country rather than for himself. In 1972, FitzGerald outlined that vision in his book Towards a New Ireland. He was in favour of pluralism and he stood for his beliefs.

FitzGerald was in school at Belvedere College at the same time as the future Archbishop of Dublin, Desmond Cardinal Connell. But in later life the cardinal would usually not even acknowledge FitzGerald’s presence if they happened to be in the same room together.

Was this because FitzGerald believed in pluralism? It was certainly a far cry from Haughey’s relationship which the cardinal’s predecessor, John Charles McQuaid.

The current controversy between the Minister for Justice and the Garda Representative Association is reminiscent of a controversy involving Haughey within weeks of his appointment as Minister for Justice in 1961. After a request from the then Garda Representative Body for a pay increase was turned down, some discontented gardaí began holding meetings in Dublin stations.

The Garda Commissioner, Daniel Costigan, banned these station meetings under the force’s disciplinary code. Disgruntled elements therefore called a meeting for the Macushla Ballroom in Amiens Street, Dublin, on November 5, 1961.

Haughey directed Costigan to warn gardaí that attendance at this unauthorised meeting would be a serious breach of discipline warranting dismissal. A total of 815 gardaí ignored the warning, but inspectors outside only recognised 167 of the men, and they only got the name of one of 30 leaders on the stage.

At the time the dispute, which some dubbed the Macushla Mutiny, was depicted as one of the most serious challenges facing the state since the Civil War. Haughey insisted on disciplinary proceedings against the 167 gardaí who had been identified.

Some gardaí went on a ‘go slow’ campaign. Dublin traffic was thrown into near chaos as they stopped directing traffic or giving out parking tickets.

After consulting with Costigan, Haughey dismissed 11 of the ringleaders on November 8, but he was cute enough to open the door for possible negotiations by stating that he was willing to enquire into garda grievances “on receiving an assurance from the commissioner that discipline had been fully restored throughout the force”.

With a crisis looming Haughey turned to Archbishop McQuaid for help. In the previous couple of years as parliamentary secretary to the minister for justice, Haughey had been in charge of the department’s legislative programme and he visited McQuaid frequently in order to clear proposed legislation with him.

This was typical of Haughey’s republicanism. It was always self-serving.

The archbishop was being allowed exert a virtual veto on legislation ever since the Mother and Child controversy of 1951. He liked Haughey and recognised him as a young man who would go far. The archbishop therefore gladly intervened on Haughey’s behalf. He announced publicly that discipline would be restored if garda grievances were investigated by the Justice Department.

“The fact that the guarantee has been given by the archbishop is good enough for me,” Haughey stated on November 13. “I am satisfied that full discipline has now been restored to the force and the commissioner agrees with me.”

The 11 dismissed men were reinstated and disciplinary proceedings against others were dropped. Haughey assured the Dáil there would be no victimisation of those taking part in the affair. The dismissed men expressed their gratitude and appreciation to the archbishop and complimented “Mr Haughey on his readiness to accept their guarantees to his Grace.”

McQuaid wrote to Taoiseach Seán Lemass two days later: “The minister has achieved something that could not otherwise have been obtained – a genuine loyalty. And it will help him at the beginning of what, please God, will be a most successful term of office.”

In the end the Macushla Mutiny turned out to be little more than a baptism of fire in Haughey’s ministerial career.

When he won the leadership of Fianna Fáil in 1979, FitzGerald was already leader of the opposition for more than two years. Haughey quickly went on television to warn that the country was living beyond its means, but having identified the problems he proceeded to do nothing about them. When FitzGerald sought to tackle the economic problems after coming to power in 1981, Haughey ridiculed him and brought the government down over the budget in January 1982. Haughey then formed what was probably the worst government in our history. Plagued by a whole series of GUBUs, it came crashing down when he was actually trying to do the right thing in implementing an economic plan known as the Way Forward.

Fine Gael knew what needed to be done, but it did not have the votes to do it, so the country drifted for much of the next five years. FitzGerald’s greatest achievement was in negotiating the Anglo-Irish Agreement which later paved the way for others to conclude the Good Friday Agreement.

HAUGHEY actually opposed the Anglo-Irish Agreement in a piece of cynical opportunism. But then he opposed everything in opposition. In the 1987 general election he pilloried Fine Gael with the campaign slogan “Health cuts hurt the old, the sick and the handicapped”.

When Haughey was elected Taoiseach for the third time on March 10, 1987, FitzGerald announced that Fine Gael would back him if he did what they all knew needed to be done. FitzGerald never really got the credit for what ultimately became known as the Tallaght Strategy.

“We are going to find it difficult at times to offer the degree of support which will be necessary for the Government to carry out their functions effectively and to overcome the great problems that face us and to take on the vested interests which are strangling this country,” FitzGerald told the Dáil that day. “It will not be easy for an opposition to support some of the measures the Government will have to take. Yet we will do so.”

Haughey did take the hard decisions, but they were relatively easy with the support of Fine Gael under Alan Dukes who duly implemented the policy outlined by FitzGerald. Dukes deserves the credit for putting the country first, but it was Garret FitzGerald who had the vision to make the offer in the first place. Haughey had a vision, too, but it was always distorted by his own ego. We need another FitzGerald now.