13 Garret FitzGerald

In a 2010 speech criticizing the Taoiseach Brian Cowen in the wake of what he called a ‘botched’ reshuffle, the Fine Gael front bench upstart Leo Varadkar chose as an unfavourable comparison not one of Cowen’s Fianna Fáil predecessors, but the man who had been a legend in his own party. Cowen, having doubled the national debt, he said, was not a Lemass or a Lynch, but a Garret FitzGerald. Varadkar went on to predict that the Taoiseach would end up writing ‘boring articles for the Irish Times’.

The outrage that followed was of an ecumenical nature. Members of every political party, and none, sprang to the defence of the now octogenarian former Taoiseach. Varadkar came under pressure to apologize, but seemed to hold his nerve. He later announced that he had written to FitzGerald ‘explaining’ his remarks. As likely as not, there was some petty personal reason for Varadkar’s tirade. But, still, the very passion of the response he provoked seemed to speak as much about the truth of his observations as anything else.

FitzGerald is a deeply admired figure in Irish society. Indeed, he has come to be loved and respected by almost everyone, not least because of his extraordinary energy, humility and approachability since leaving office. He continues writing his weekly Irish Times column, which, contrary to Varadkar’s assertion, is not always boring. (Although once, the same copy was inadvertently published two weeks running and not a single reader contacted the newspaper to complain.) He is a regular guest on radio and television panels discussing politics and economics. Often, nearing the end of a seminar on some vital public matter, when the time comes for questions from the floor, Garret stands up and delivers himself of a detailed analysis of the merits and shortcomings of everything that has been said. Sometimes, strangers gaze at him in wonder and declare: ‘That guy is fantastic! He should go into politics!’

Garret FitzGerald was for nearly five years, between 1982 and 1987, the leader of the Irish government, and in that time, as Leo Varadkar said, he doubled the national debt. But nobody really blames Garret for that. It was really all Charlie Haughey’s fault. If Haughey had kept his promises, Garret wouldn’t have inherited such a disaster of an economy to begin with. In the 1980s, there was only one game in town, and that was the drama of Garret the Good versus Charlie the Great National Bastard. It is possible to state this in a way that seems ironic, even sarcastic, at Garret’s expense, but the fact of the matter was that, of the two men, FitzGerald was by far the more likeable and the more morally upright.

But he was also a disastrous politician. He spoke constantly of why he had ‘come into politics’. In fact, he spoke constantly, period. He talked and talked until the donkeys of Ireland were entirely bereft of hind legs. Garret is a deeply intelligent and interesting man. He reads voraciously: history, economics, theology, philosophy, poetry. He is truly brilliant. He likes listening to classical music. He loves his wife and children. Coming to power at a period when, for the first time in nearly 150 years, a generation of young people was able to think about staying in Ireland, he attracted the hopes of both the young people and their parents, thus ensuring that Fine Gael gained, under his leadership, the highest number of seats in its history. Since his departure as leader, the party has come nowhere close to a similar achievement.

U2 singer Bono was among those who became briefly infatuated with Garret, whom he invited down to a recording session in Windmill Lane. In return, Garret appointed him to a body set up to look at issues affecting ‘the youth’. Bono, realizing the whole thing was just a talking shop, slipped away after the first meeting.

On the face of it, Garret seemed to be the perfect leader for a new country coming out of the mists of a blighted history. He had charisma, intellect and boundless energy. He had been a working journalist, so he understood how the media worked. He surrounded himself with savvy advisers, who understood things like image and communication strategy. He had vision – he wanted to usher in a non-sectarian, pluralist Ireland as a way of reassuring unionists across the border that Rome no longer ruled the roost. He had courage: he was not, generally speaking, afraid of bishops. He attracted women and young people into Fine Gael. But there was something missing, and this something missing became the tragedy not just for Garret but for all those who placed their hopes at his door. He was absent-minded, but that wasn’t it. His absent-mindedness simply added to his professorial persona – like the way he emerged one day in public wearing unmatched shoes. He explained that he had put them on in the dark because he hadn’t wanted to wake his wife by putting on the light. It was all so Garret.

He talked and talked. Cabinet meetings went on interminably as he argued and debated with himself. One colleague at the cabinet table at that time was quoted thusly: ‘He has an extraordinary mind, but it has no filter, no perspective, no defence mechanism against all the interesting but irrelevant details which come to distract him.’ He had an obsession – no, a love affair – with figures. It was he, really, more than anyone, who identified the scale of the problem with the Irish economy in the early 1980s. But he was unable to do anything about it except make it far, far worse.

When, as a guest on the Terry Wogan show on BBC television as his administration shuddered towards its apocalyptic conclusion, the Limerick-born host asked him if things at home were not truly abysmal. Garret grinned and said that, in fact, Ireland was now producing more computer scientists per capita than the United States. At the time it was seen as evidence of how out of touch Garret was, but within a decade, with the economy back in the black and Ireland rapidly revealing itself as the IT hub of Europe, Garret’s professorial pronouncement didn’t seem quite so nutty.

In the long run, of course, it didn’t matter. With the benefit of hindsight, the difficulties of the 1980s were a minor blip compared to what happened in 2009. But the real problem about the Garret experience was that it would be a long time again before the Irish electorate would be able to trust the type of educated, sophisticated man who read books, listened to Mozart and would, later, write for the Irish Times. We became wary of talkers and thinkers, which is why, perhaps, we ended up with monosyllabic mediocrities and affable actors who never, ever get their shoes mixed up.