Irish Examiner view: Holohan fiasco was a mess from beginning to end

Former CMO's withdrawal sets the clock back — there is a role to be filled but the person apparently most qualified to fill it is now out of the frame

Dr Tony Holohan: Picture: Julien Behal/PA

There’s a memorable scene in the movie No Country For Old Men where the grizzled law enforcer played by Tommy Lee Jones is asked by an enthusiastic young deputy: “It’s a mess, ain’t it sheriff?” He answers wearily: “If it ain’t, it’ll do ’til the mess gets here.”

Cormac McCarthy might have written those lines for the imbroglio that is the on, and now off, secondment of Dr Tony Holohan as professor of public health leadership and strategy at Trinity College, Dublin. The role that was created solely for Dr Holohan, who is standing down as the country’s chief medical officer after more than two gruelling years leading the fight against the pandemic and grappling with unpopular decisions affecting the personal freedoms of everyone.

It is rare for roles to be created for which there is only one suitable person.

Where you have an overlap with public finances and politicians the dangers are clear. It can lead to accusations of patronage and cronyism, and turn an initially good idea — utilising specialist skills and expertise — into a turkey shoot.

Last year we had a smaller but still unedifying example of this with the row over creating a UN special envoy position for Katherine Zappone. A more recent argument emerged over the opaque nature of the financial arrangements for Department of Health secretary general Robert Watt.

Dr Holohan decided to withdraw from the role because he “wishes to avoid any further unnecessary distraction... for senior politicians and civil servants”. He is looking forward to sharing his “knowledge and expertise outside of the public service”. No doubt he will not be short of offers.

The apparently open-ended financial arrangements on the public payroll had, anyway, been paused by Taoiseach Micheál Martin while he waited for further information on how the role was approved. 

Mr Martin wants more “transparency” on the subject and shouldn’t really have to ask for that. Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said he wanted to be satisfied that a secondment was necessary at all, adding that nobody in Government was happy with the manner in which it was handled. Mr Varadkar had “assumed” that the position had been secured in an open competition.

Stephen Donnelly, the health minister, emerges from this controversy with the largest dollop of egg on his face. At best he looks credulous, failing to ask the correct questions. At worst he has delegated too much authority to Mr Watt, himself one of Europe’s highest-paid civil servants.

Dr Holohan’s withdrawal sets the clock back. There is a role to be filled but the person apparently most qualified to fill it is now out of the frame.

As McCarthy also wrote: “You never know what worse luck your bad luck has saved you from.” 

Both Dr Holohan and discomforted politicians might be able to take comfort from that.