Harney’s hairdo is trivial compared to the way she has failed taxpayers

Fás squandered $437 on the barometer and a further €419 sending it back to Ireland. Thus around €800 was misappropriated in this one instance

SOME of the Fine Gael criticism of Mary Harney getting a wash and blowdry in Florida smacked of cynical opportunism, especially the nonsense about her not clarifying that she she got her hair done in Florida in 2004.

John Bruton withheld information from the Dáil on May 24, 1995. When challenged on this the following day, he explained that he had not been asked the right question.

“I did indeed have that information with me in the House,” he admitted, “but I was not asked the question.” In the circumstances it was both hypocritical and absurd of Fine Gael’s Leo Varadkar to call for Mary Harney’s resignation because of her failure to answer a question they did not ask.

It was also politically inept because it was distracting from matters that should be highlighted and answered, like the more than €1 million squandered on a website that never functioned.

Mary Harney probably should resign, but not because of the hairdo, which is insignificant in comparison with the millions that have been squandered in her various departments. She has presided over the greatest waste in the history of the State at the HSE where officials have been paying themselves exorbitant bonuses despite their gross failings.

The cost of that wash and blowdry in Florida pales into insignificance in comparison with the thousands of taxpayers’ money that Bertie Ahern spent on make-up. Mary Harney could have charged the hairdo as a ministerial expense. Ultimately the Irish public was going to pay for it anyway, but she did not follow correct procedures.

In the greater scheme of things, it was a trifling mater. But as Albert Reynolds found out to his own cost, it is the small things that trip up politicians.

He was forced out because he did not tell the Dáil that some monk had supposedly been extradited for paedophile offences, and that this was a precedent for the extradition of Fr Brendan Smyth.

Reynolds said he did not understand the significance of the whole thing at the time, and he clearly didn’t. He was, in fact railroaded right out of the Taoiseach’s office.

The man who was extradited was not a monk at all. He was a civilian teacher who was extradited for offences that occurred little over a year earlier, whereas the Smyth offences stretched back over 20 years. The case was not, therefore, a precedent for the Smyth case. Albert’s was undone by his own lack of patience. He had forced the pace on the appointment of Harry Whelehan as president of the High Court and the two of them got trampled in the ensuing political stampede. “When I became leader of Fianna Fáil and Taoiseach I set myself two political objectives — to achieve peace in Northern Ireland and on the whole island and to turn the economy around,” Reynolds told the Dáil just before he resigned. “I was fortunate in such a short space of time to achieve those two political objectives.”

When someone complained privately that Reynolds was claiming too much credit for the advances on the North, Dick Spring intervened to say Reynolds had gone out on a limb in taking the initiative in the Northern peace process and deserved that credit.

When witnesses provide testimony that does not show themselves in a good light, it is normally considered most effective testimony. Likewise, when politicians credit their enemies with achievements, it is compelling evidence.

“In life, in business and politics, you cannot win them all. You win some, you lose some, but throughout my life in politics and business I have been delighted to be a risk-taker,” Reynolds told the Dáil just before he went to the Áras to hand in his resignation.

“If you are not a risk-taker you will not achieve anything. The easiest way in life is not to be a risk-taker. Yes, I was a risk-taker in politics and business, but I am quite happy that, having taken the risks, the successes far outweighed the failures.”

While Mary Harney’s hairdo is attracting the spotlight, the more serious question about the gift of the glass barometer to Mary Hanafin is being largely ignored. She was not entitled to a barometer from Fás. Unlike the hairdo, she would not have been entitled to write it off as a ministerial expense.

Fás squandered $437 on the barometer and a further €419 sending it back to Ireland. Thus around €800 was misappropriated in this one instance. How many other gifts were given to ministers and their friends at the taxpayers’ expense?

It was a criminal waste of public money and the chances are that it was just the tip of a figurative iceberg, especially in view of the way that the former secretary general of Fás, Rody Molloy, defended the whole thing on Pat Kenny’s radio programme. He appeared to see absolutely nothing wrong with such behaviour.

If that performance was surprising, however, the response of Taoiseach Brian Cowen in defending him was absolutely mind-blowing. The Taoiseach defended Mr Molloy as “a person whom I personally hold in the highest regard and whose integrity I would defend at all times”.

Within a matter of hours, however, the Taoiseach was telling the Dáil that some of the Fás expenditures should not have been incurred. He even encouraged colleagues to ensure that nothing similar has been happening at agencies within their ministerial remit.

Very shortly afterwards, Rody Molloy resigned from Fás. It has since been suggested on air that he is now going to get a golden handshake of around €300,000. For what? It seems the Government has lost total touch with reality. What we have been witnessing is a perversion of democracy.

IN A democracy all people are supposedly equal. Much has been made of Mary Harney’s travel expenses being paid, but during more than 30 years in Leinster House she would have collected relatively little in comparison with others because she has always been living in Dublin.

Other members of the Dáil have been claiming travelling expenses that have little relationship to the actual cost of their travel. They also get overnight expenses that are frequently out of proportion to what they pay.

Deputies who are aged over 66 have free rail travel, yet they can claim mileage from their homes to Dublin. This is a gross abuse of taxpayers’ money.

The rest of the people in the country have to pay their own travel expenses going to and from work each day. They cannot even claim those expenses for tax purposes, while the politicians pay themselves handsome travel expenses that have little relationship to their actual travel costs. Such perks really amount to a tax-free supplement to their salaries.

In these strident times, surely it is not too much to expect — indeed demand — leadership and proper example from our so-called leaders. The travelling gravytrain ought to be stopped.

This should include excessive and unnecessary payments to all politicians, national and local, along with the various officials who have made a racket out of claiming travelling expenses. It will only be stopped, however, if there is transparency in the form of full disclosure to the public who are, after, all picking up the tab.