defeat – a testament to his enduring commitment to public service. He was a fine man and an excellent Finance Minister. Moreover, I can honestly say that his leadership is greatly missed internationally.
3 IN MEMORY OF BRIAN LENIHAN: A PERSONAL REFLECTION
PAUL GALLAGHER
AFTER THE CONCLUSION OF our last Cabinet Meeting on 8 March 2011, it was Brian Lenihan’s turn to speak and say his goodbyes. He began with a short recitation of Milton, effortless and poignant. He finished exuding his usual confidence and positivity. He was the only Fianna Fáil TD from a Dublin constituency to retain his seat. He was still working hard. There were difficult outstanding banking issues to be dealt with. Brian had his papers with him and he had earlier been discussing an issue that needed to be resolved prior to the change of government. He was still energised and quietly defiant. Though he knew death was approaching, it was difficult for the rest of us to believe this to be the case. He spoke and acted as if, like his colleagues, he were merely moving on to the next chapter of his life.
This reflection is offered as a personal insight derived from my very significant contact with Brian in the last few years of his life. The focus is on Brian and the context in which he discharged his public duties.
Brian was a remarkable man. His courage and determination were evident in the manner in which he met, without complaint, the great trials and obstacles he faced in the last few years of his life. Brian’s life changed utterly in the summer of 2008. From then, until his death three years later, his life was dominated by political and personal challenges. He has left a great legacy of courage and determination and provided an example of what the human spirit can achieve no matter how constrained by circumstances.
It will take much calmer reflection at a national level to recognise the true enormity of the challenges, arising from the financial and economic crisis, faced by Brian Lenihan and his Government colleagues between June 2008 to March 2011. The challenges were unrelenting in their ferocity, their scale, their complexity and their novelty. There was little guidance to those who had the unenviable task of dealing with the challenges and of making urgent and critical decisions on matters of great complexity and consequence. There was no consensus amongst experts here or abroad as to how those challenges should be met. There were so many uncertainties and so many unknown and uncontrollable factors rendering any decision difficult and risk prone. The one certainty was that avoiding decisions was not an option.
In this personal reflection, I do not attempt to portray in detail the atmosphere and environment of the time or the context in which Brian had to operate. It is important, however, to understand that context in a general way in order to understand Brian and his achievements. It must also be recognised that throughout his period of office, as is well known, Brian received great support from his colleagues in government and, in particular, from the Taoiseach. The Minister for Finance is a member of government and the major decisions that he takes are approved by government. Brian also received great support from the Secretary-Generals in the Department of Finance and from so many other civil servants and advisers. In reflecting on Brian’s achievements, it is very important that the role of others should not be overlooked.1
Brian was a brilliant young barrister, but it was clear that politics was the great love of his life. He could have enjoyed great and enduring success at the Bar. He had, in fact, become a Senior Counsel in 1997 but ultimately the call of public service drowned out any thought of personal gain. Brian’s reward for this selfless public service came when he was appointed Minister for Justice on 14 June 2007.
Brian was a dynamic and very hard-working Minister for Justice. He was full of new ideas and had very definite views on what he needed to do as Minister. I was always impressed by his deep understanding of his responsibilities and, in particular, his great respect for the law and the Constitution. He also had a deep understanding of politics and of the political system. This was of immense help to him in proposing and securing the passage of legislation. He had an intense interest in the legislative agenda and committed himself to some critical legislative projects (which his short time in the portfolio prevented him from bringing to a conclusion), including Civil Partnership and Immigration,2 the latter being designed to implement very significant reforms in immigration law and procedures. He had an excellent understanding not only of the legal problems which his legislation sought to address, but also of the technicalities of the legislation and of the practicalities in terms of what could be achieved. Above all, Brian had great integrity and a deep belief in the Rule of Law.
In 2008, during the Slovenian Presidency of the European Union, I accompanied Brian on a trip to Ljubljana for a Council of Ministers’ meeting in the area of Justice and Home Affairs. At the meeting, he was fully in command of his brief and was clearly highly respected by his European colleagues. My abiding memory of the trip, however, related not to the official business, but to Brian’s deep interest in a little known Irish saint, St. Coloman of Stockerau, who as an Irish pilgrim travelling to the Holy Land was tortured and hanged near Vienna on suspicion of being a spy. St. Coloman had travelled through Slovenia on his journey to the Holy Land. Brian, being deeply interested in history and all things Irish, was interested in learning more about St. Coloman’s connection with Slovenia, despite the fact that, at best, St. Coloman was one of history’s footnotes. I was struck by Brian’s effortless knowledge of this little known saint and his quite extraordinary hunger for more knowledge about him. This, of course, was very characteristic of Brian. There was no subject, however, arcane or esoteric, in which he was not interested and very few matters about which he did not display a very impressive This ability to store and assimilate information was to stand him in good stead in the forthcoming challenges of which he was then blissfully unaware. knowledge, not only of the general subject matter, but of the detail.
Brian had great enthusiasm for all aspects of his Justice brief and displayed the surefootedness and insight of a longstanding and very experienced minister. A life in politics had prepared him well. These were qualities that were very apparent to his colleagues. Taoiseach Brian Cowen made an inspired decision in choosing Brian as his Minister for Finance in May 2008. It was in this latter office that Brian will be long remembered. Much has been said about Brian in that role. Much has been made of Brian’s ministerial inexperience, his lack of any qualifications in finance or economics and of the fact that he had little time to prepare for the financial maelstrom, which hit the financial systems of Europe and the United States in late summer 2008.
Those comments are usually stated by way of an implied criticism, but, in my view, they miss the point. It is true that Brian had been a Minister for less than a year when he was appointed Minister for Finance, but few elected representatives ever had such a profound and instinctive knowledge of the operations of government and of parliamentary democracy. Brian had been acquiring political knowledge all his life, having grown up in a deeply political environment. It is also true that Brian had no formal qualifications in finance or economics, but very few Ministers of Finance in Ireland or, indeed, elsewhere have had such qualifications. He had other qualities which were of equal if not greater importance. He had the ability to rapidly absorb complex information and to apply it to the practical reality confronting him. He also had the confidence and judgment to make decisions. He knew when to listen and when to act. He canvassed many opinions from many different people. These served not to impede his decision-making process, but contributed to it. He readily segregated good and bad advice and was not afraid to reject advice from any quarter if, after consideration, he did not agree with it. He was open to ideas and to suggestions, but never feared having to make a decision and to take responsibility for it. From time to time, I have heard commentators suggest that Brian may not have had an understanding of technical details. I do not agree. There were, undoubtedly, many things he had to learn. He, undoubtedly, made mistakes. He did, however, possess the capacity to master technical information and issues confidently and quickly and, when he needed to make important
