They also served…
David Byrne is Ireland’s current Commissioner until the end of October when his successor will take over.
He is the first European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection, with particular responsibility for Public Health, Food Safety and Consumer Rights.
He was Attorney General from June 1997 to July 1999 when the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern offered him the job in Brussels.
Normally not considered a high-profile portfolio as it includes areas where the EU has few responsibilities, a series of emergencies including foot and mouth and mad cow disease quickly changed that.
Initially he had hoped to remain for a second term but the Taoiseach made it clear this was not on the cards. Now he will return to Dublin but plans to do some work for the World Health Organisation, which awarded him a special medal for his work on tobacco and smoking.
He has also had offers from some New York legal firms that could prove much more lucrative than the commissionership or a job on the judges’ bench in Ireland.
The Irish Commissioner with the highest profile in Ireland, mainly for the wrong reasons.
Part of the country ’n western Fianna Fáil group, he held a number of ministerial posts from 1982.
He resigned from the Cabinet in 1991 together with Albert Reynolds and Charlie McCreevy and a number of others when they supported a motion of no confidence in the then Taoiseach, Charles J Haughey.
The following year he was back in government as Minister for Justice and in 1993 went to Brussels as Commissioner with the Social Affairs portfolio.
The man who infamously suggested the then Presidential candidate Mary Robinson should stay at home was seen as a champion of women’s rights during his term.
He made his comments on the Late Late Show in January 1999 regarding Tom Gilmartin’s donation of £50,000. He, with the rest of the Commission, was forced to resign in September 1999 over allegations of malpractice.
Since then he has been living a relatively quiet life in his home town of Castlebar (where the now 65-year-old once taught in the local boy’s primary school) waiting to appear before the Mahon Tribunal.
Other than his pension he has not managed to carve out a new source of income based on his experience in Europe.
The Sligo man was Tánaiste and Minister for Finance and Governor of the European Investment Bank in 1982.
He got his first taste of Europe as MEP for Connaught/Ulster from 1984 to 1987 and then served a second term as Minister for Finance from 1987 to 1988.
He moved to Brussels in 1989 as Commissioner and got the portfolio of Agriculture. He is best remembered for the McSharry reforms in agriculture.
These did not dismantle the extensive Common Agriculture Policy, but made sufficient concessions to limit the subsidies paid to farmers. It reduced the guaranteed price of products paid to farmers and switched subsidies towards direct payments.
He moved into private business, having seats on bank boards and presiding over the eircom stock market launch.
In February 2003 he was recalled to Europe by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern as the Government’s representative to the Convention on the Future of the EU.
After a few months he returned to the world of private business and his post in the Convention was taken up by Europe Minister Dick Roche.
Peter Sutherland was Attorney General when he was nominated by the Fine Gael government as Ireland’s Commissioner in 1985.
His portfolio put him in charge of Competition Policy and he also had responsibility for Social Affairs, Health and Education for a time.
He was in the frame for Commission President but Fianna Fáil Taoiseach Albert Reynolds would not consider him. His name was mentioned in connection with the job again last month.
He is the Commissioner who made the most use of his experience in Europe, first landing the job of Director General of GATT, negotiating a landmark trading agreement between the EU and US.
This led to his job as first Director General of the World Trade Organisation and with being credited as the architect of globalisation.
Later he held lucrative chairmanships of Goldman Sachs International banking in which he has shares valued recently at $87 million, and he is chairman of the petroleum company BP.
The second of Ireland’s commissioners and the only one so far to serve two terms.
He was the Fianna Fáil Minister for Education for three years before going to Brussels in 1977.
A native of Thurles and a former teacher, he got the portfolios of Taxation, Consumer Affairs and Transport and Relations.
This was a relatively low-profile portfolio at the time as the Union had few powers in these areas and the Parliament had even fewer.
He returned to Brussels in March 1982 when the then Commissioner, Michael O’Kennedy, decided against taking up the post. This time he was Commissioner with responsibility for Personnel and Administration and the Statistics Office.
He had an advisory role with an Asian company after leaving the Commission and is now retired. He returned to the spotlight briefly to campaign for a Yes vote in the second Nice referendum.
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