Office of Presidency should be scrapped along with the Seanad

THE Senate was abolished before and it was a great pity that it was brought back, because the present Seanad has only been a drain on resources. It could have been reformed to provide a useful purpose any time in the last 70 years, but now it is too late.

We should have the referendum to abolish it in conjunction with the next general election, rather than waiting to elect a new Seanad so that it could help to abolish itself. This is no time for expensive obsequies.

We should scrap the office of President as well. After independence in 1922 the British king was still technically the head of state. To ensure a greater degree of independence, the Free State Government nominated Tim Healy as Governor-General, and the king appointed him on the advice of the Government.

James McNeill, who succeeded Healy as Governor-General in 1928, promptly clashed with the king’s Private Secretary by being the first Governor-General to accept, and open, letters of credence from foreign diplomats, rather than forwarding them unopened to the king. He also caused a stir by refusing to attend a function at Trinity College, because it insisted on playing God Save the King as the national anthem, instead of Amhrán na bhFiann. When de Valera came to power in 1932, McNeill went to Leinster House to save the Long Fellow the indignity of having to go to the Vice Regal Lodge to receive his commission.

Nevertheless, de Valera and company essentially boycotted the Governor-General thereafter. Ministers avoided functions that he attended. On one occasion two ministers were already at a function when McNeill arrived, so they walked out. McNeill demanded an apology from de Valera for the conduct of those ministers, but the Long Fellow merely replied that it would not happen again if the Governor-General informed the Government of the functions he planned to attend.

When McNeill threatened to publish their correspondence, de Valera formally advised him not to do so, but McNeill released the letters anyway. De Valera then demanded that the king remove McNeill as Governor-General. This firmly established the principle that the Governor-General was the nominee of the Government, not the Crown.

The Government slashed the Governor-General’s salary by 80% and appointed a reject politician, Domnall Ó Buachalla, who moved into a house in suburban Dublin and signed bills when he was told.

When Edward VIII abdicated, the Fianna Fáil Government abolished the post of Governor-General. Ó Buachalla was supposed to have another year, and he had signed a lease on his residence. He was out of a job and did not need the house in Dublin, but the Government refused to compensate him.

In the 1937 Constitution an elected President was introduced as a republican symbol, but over the years it has become a republican travesty. President Douglas Hyde spent one undistinguished seven-year term in the Áras, incapacitated by a stroke for most of the time. When he died in 1949 he was accorded a State funeral, but Noel Browne was the only member of the Government who attended the Protestant church service.

President Seán T O’Kelly, Taoiseach John A Costello, and de Valera, who was then leader of the Opposition, all waited outside the church in their cars.

O’Kelly did nothing memorable in 14 years as President, and then Éamon de Valera was put out to pasture in the Park.

De Valera sacked ministers Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney at the request of Taoiseach Jack Lynch during the Arms Crisis of 1970, and he later persuaded Frank Aiken not to go public with his reasons for not standing for re-election in 1973.

Aiken withdrew in protest against the acceptance of Haughey as a Fianna Fáil candidate. With the help of the President, Lynch lied shamelessly that Aiken was quitting on doctor’s orders.

Erskine Childers replaced de Valera in 1973, but he served little over a year before he died. He was followed by CearballÓ Dálaigh, who resigned in a huff after being called “a thundering disgrace” by Defence Minister Paddy Donegan for conscientiously performing one his presidential functions in submitting what he considered a constitutionally dubious bill to the Supreme Court. It was the inebriated Donegan who was the thundering disgrace.

Paddy Hillery played golf for 14 years in the Áras. He was probably paid more than Christy O’Connor, who made 10 Ryder Cup teams!

Hillery famously declined to exercise his Presidential prerogative to refuse to dissolve the Dáil in 1982 after the defeat of the Government’s budget. Charles Haughey had a number of people telephone Hillery to reject Garret FitzGerald’s request for a general election. This later caused complications when Brian Lenihan told a research student on tape that he had made one of the calls, but then he told the whole nation that he had not done so.

The Progressive Democrats demanded he be sacked as Tánaiste for lying. This was during the 1990 Presidential election, which Mary Robinson duly won. She was the first woman President, and she pranced around looking elegant.

AT the outset when she called for the dismissal of the domestic staff at the Áras, Taoiseach Charles Haughey sacked them on Christmas Eve, which was his way of highlighting her “socialist” credentials. She quit the office before completing a full term in order to take up a job at the United Nations, but her pension rose to over €119,000 by the time she was 60. It was only in the past year she became eligible for the old age pension, by which time she had received over €1 million in pension payments even while working in other jobs.

What kind of example is this for a republic? Mary McAleese had the guts to attend a Protestant service and then essentially tell Cardinal Desmond Connell where he could shove his opinion when he denounced her. She stood up for the republic. She has been our best President, but she was wasted in the job and could have provided much better service in Leinster House.

The functions of her office should be jointly transferred to the Taoiseach and the Chief Justice. When it comes to referring legislation to the Supreme Court, the Chief Justice could fulfil that function, while the Taoiseach and Tánaiste could fulfil the ceremonial functions.

We all know the office of President is really only symbolic, but would somebody please tell me what it is a symbol of — greed or stupidity?