Maurice McCabe: Quiet man who started a historic reform
Maurice McCabe has not bared his soul in any newspaper interviews or addressed any public gathering. The only gathering he has appeared before was the Public Accounts Committee last January, and that was behind closed doors.
The only TV and still shots of McCabe are those showing him entering and leaving Leinster House on that day he appeared before the PAC. He looks nothing out of the ordinary, dressed, at least partly, in his garda uniform, a carrier bag slung over his shoulder. The shots now frequently shown on news bulletins depict him seeking out the entrance to Leinster House, a polite smile on his face. He nods at the garda standing at the entrance, colleagues from the same side of the street, but living in different worlds.
The pictures also show his exit, some hours later. Darkness has fallen, the cameras are flashing, McCabe is moving fast towards a vehicle that has pulled up to take him away, the long frame of his sometime kindred spirit John Wilson, rushing up to shut the car door after McCabe. And then he’s gone. That’s it folks, the brief shots of a man with no public voice or profile, one who it now appears may be responsible for changing the nature of policing in this country.
McCabe’s actions have led to unprecedented upheaval in politics and policing.
A garda commissioner has resigned, after, it would appear, having been left with little option from his political masters. A minister for justice has resigned. A man appointed to the role of confidential recipient has resigned. At the time of writing, it’s unclear whether they will be joined by others. The reputations of some very senior cops have been damaged.
A whole slew of inquiries have been established. McCabe is directly responsible for the setting up of a new police authority, the biggest reform of policing since the formation of An Garda Síochána, 80 years ago.
The development, if handled properly, will remove politics from policing. That alone will have far-reaching implications. For instance, currently, all promotions above the rank of superintendent have to be approved by government, something that has long led to the opinion that being well-in with the powers that be is more important than being a talented or diligent cop.
So who is this guy? Figures who have been responsible for great change understandably often possess large egos. They tend to enjoy the limelight, the public affirmation of their achievements.
Others, such as whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, cut solitary figures. This type of individual, while primarily driven by a moral compass, also finds it difficult to fit in, and is therefore not completely discommoded by standing out for what they believe in.
The unusual thing about McCabe, for such an extraordinary individual, is his ordinariness. He is a family man, happily married with five children. A number of his extended family still live within a few miles of his home in Co Cavan. He is a social being, although because of his actions within the force, his social circle has tightened over the last six years.
Prior to finding himself in conflict with garda management, he was regarded as a good and diligent officer, somebody who took his work seriously, but not obsessively.
On leaving his posting at Clones in 2004, the local district judge commented from the bench on his good work, and that he would be missed locally. The issues that would transform his life arose at his new posting in Bailieborough, Co Cavan.
The sloppy work, the failure to properly investigate serious crimes, the culture that was inappropriate in a modern police force, all drove him to act as he did. Most likely, he was not unique in feeling frustrated and angry at what he saw as serious shortcomings. An Garda Síochána has plenty of diligent, serious men and women who do their job properly. The difference was that McCabe was not willing to ignore what was going on around him. Where most others put up the shortcomings, and got on with their own job, he wouldn’t let it go.
He was not alone in bringing systemic problems to the attention of management.
But in nearly all other cases, once that was done, the complainants had satisfied their sense of duty, passed on responsibility, knowing that further persistence would lead to a place where the stakes were much higher. At a certain point, awkward questions or complaints are invariably going to cost career prospects. That’s the juncture at which most people, understandably, come to an accommodation with their conscience.
Not McCabe. As far as he was concerned, he was right and he was going to go the whole hog. The resistance he met was fierce. He was isolated. Early on, he realised he had to protect himself, so be began taping every encounter connected to his complaints or job.
He was subjected to harassment within the force, and largely ignored outside it, in places like the Department of Justice.
There were attempts to frame him in order to cast aspersions on his character and motives. On more than one occasion he was referred to a psychiatrist, an obvious attempt to portray him as having psychiatric problems.
The message was clear. Somebody within the force making the kind of allegations he was making must be mad. After all, the senior management, the government, the elements of the media who cover the force, all know that everything is systemically hunky dory. Isn’t it? Quite obviously, this guy with his “disgusting” allegations mustn’t be the full shilling. It’s not a stretch to say that he endured hell while groping in the darkness for a chink of light.
What separated McCabe was a stubborn belief in what he was doing, and the good fortune to have a strong family around him.
Last January, ahead of his appearance at the PAC, the chairman John McGuinness read out a letter he had received from the persistent sergeant.
“Having been treated the way I was for reporting the above, I don’t think that I would do it again. It destroyed me, my career and my family,” he wrote.
Yesterday’s publication of the Guerin report was the end of a long road. One person close to McCabe pointed out that it was the setting up of the Guerin inquiry in February, rather than the results published yesterday, that represented the end of the road for him.
“He had won. Somebody completely removed from the force was going to look into his complaints and the way he’d been treated. That was all he wanted.”
His voice has not been heard in public, but his actions have reverberated along the hard road where history is made.
