Banking inquiry: Democracy is being demeaned

It’s almost two years to the day — June 26 — since the great scriptwriter Nora Ephron died. She was the creator of Silkwood, When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle, and Julie & Julia — and many other wonderfully light pieces that looked at our endless foolishness with kindness and good humour.

She softened the everyday tragedy of human foibles, needless inhibition, and shameless ambition with the balm of humour and charm. Despite her sense of farce, she could not do justice to the bank inquiry fiasco.

It epitomises everything wrong with our political system and, unfortunately, reveals the unattractive character of so many principle players. It reveals the detachment and sense of privilege and, tragically, the self-serving opportunism and dishonesty that shapes the world view of too many politicians. It has become an affront to our political system, our democracy and the mandate given to politicians by the electorate, or at least the one-in-two still bothered to vote. Those expected to be grilled by the inquiry — bankers, regulators, and politicians — and those in a position to offer concessions on the unsustainable bank debt imposed on this country — bankers, regulators, and politicians — must be watching with a bemused indifference: “Nothing to worry about here,” might well be their reaction.

Yesterday morning’s RTÉ performance by Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin was as fine an example of sanctimony and hypocrisy since Ian Paisley stopped his bigoted rabble rousing because it was an impediment to achieving power. It is entirely natural that Mr Martin would do all he can to undermine the process because the inquiry may recall Fianna Fáil’s disastrous mismanagement. If the widely held view that our economic collapse is rooted in nudge-nudge, look-away regulation and opportunism dependent on tacit political endorsement is confirmed — and it may not be — then Mr Martin will probably be the first leader of Fianna Fáil never to become Taoiseach. The stakes are, for Fianna Fáil at least, in the do-or-die category. They must derail the inquiry or face the prospect of a report as damning as any endured by the Catholic Church in recent years. This would hardly contribute to the rejuvenation of a party struggling to recover even a fraction of the popularity it once, almost without question, enjoyed.

Labour senator Susan O’Keeffe’s role exemplifies the detachment and sense of privilege so alive in our political class. She missed the vital vote, and created the opportunity on which Fianna Fáil so gleefully pounced, because she wanted to be at home to support a child — a young adult really — doing the Leaving Certificate.

Many thousands of parents would like to do the same and feel terribly guilty that they cannot, but different obligations rule their lives — they have to go to work. Simply put, she should have been at the meeting or ensured her absence was covered by a pairing. She did neither and that she is still involved is laughable. It is also a slap in the face to those parents — those who pay her €50,000 salary for her part-time job — who were not in a position to make that choice.

There is a degree of plausibility in the assertion by Finance Minister Michael Noonan yesterday that adding two members to the committee was doing no more than restoring the norm — that a Dáil majority is reflected in committee memberships — but it still reeks of an autocratic determination to steer the proceedings in a certain direction. It was hardly a noble intervention and, in time, it may be seen as counterproductive, as the facts, if they are what we imagine them to be, will speak for themselves. Yesterday’s late contribution from Enda Kenny, that the inquiry will be independent of Cabinet and will not operate under Government instruction is hardly the ringing reassurance needed to undo the damage inflicted on our system of inquiry.

As things stand, the objective of the inquiry seems more remote than ever. Those responsible for the greatest economic disaster endured by this Republic may not have to account for themselves in any meaningful way while the posse fights like schoolboys over who gets to wear the sheriff’s badge. If it was not so very serious, so very dysfunctional, it might be entertaining. All the while Sinn Féin strategists look on wondering why it has taken them so very long to become a force in the land, why it has taken them so long to replace the establishment parties that seem far more determined to protect their own positions than they are to uncover the truth about our rotten banks.

This sorry episode brings shame on all of our political parties and challenges the faith of the electorate in a very dangerous way. And the really frightening thing is that the alternative may be even worse.