Finucane contributes humanitarian aid during the Nigerian Civil War (also known as the “Nigerian-Biafran War”), from 1967 to 1970. The Nigerian government had blocked food supplies to the successionist state of Biafra causing starvation in the country. This is reported on international television stations and receives worldwide condemnation.
In an effort to save the population from starvation, Finucane organizes food to be sent through makeshift airstrips, including one at Uli, Bafaria, and cargo trips with other Dublin-based workers. This leads to the formation of the organisation Concern Worldwide in 1968. He works with Concern for 41 years and views his mission as “love in action.”
Finucane dies of cancer at the age of 77 on October 6, 2009 in a Dublin Spiritan Fathers’ nursing home in Kimmage Manor. His funeral is held at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Kimmage and is attended by hundreds. The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Micheál Martin, and Minister for Overseas Development, Peter Power, dub him as a “tireless force for good across the globe for more than four decades.” He is buried at Dardistown Cemetery, in the Spiritan plot.
Finucane’s biography, Aengus Finucane: In the Heart of Concern, written by Deirdre Purcell is published by New Island Books in January 2015.
After some years as curate at St. Paul’s Church in Dublin, Murray is transferred to Arklow, and is there in 1798 when the rebellion breaks out. The yeomanry shoot the parish priest in bed and Murray, to escape a similar fate, flees to the city where for two years he serves as curate at St. Andrew’s Chapel on Hawkins Street. As a preacher, he is said to be particularly effective, especially in appeals for charitable causes, such as the schools. He is then assigned to the Chapel of St. Mary in Upper Liffey Street where Archbishop John Troy is the parish priest.
Murray is an uncompromising opponent of a proposal granting the British government a “veto” over Catholic ecclesiastical appointments in Ireland, and in 1814 and 1815, makes two separate trips to Rome concerning the controversy.
Murray becomes Archbishop of Dublin in 1825 and on November 14, 1825 celebrates the completion of St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral. He enjoys the confidence of successive popes, and is held in high respect by the British government. His life is mainly devoted to ecclesiastical affairs, the establishment and organisation of religious associations for the education and relief of the poor. With the outbreak of cholera in the 1830s, in 1834 he and Mother Aikenhead found St. Vincent’s Hospital. He persuades Edmund Rice to send members of the Christian Brothers to Dublin to start a school for boys. The first is opened in a lumber yard on the City-quay. He assists Catherine McAuley in founding the Sisters of Mercy, and in 1831 professes the first three members.
Edward Bouverie Pusey has an interview with Murray in 1841, and bears testimony to his moderation, and John Henry Newman has some correspondence with him prior to Newman’s conversion from the Anglican Church to the Roman Catholic Church in 1845. A seat in the privy council at Dublin, officially offered to him in 1846, is not accepted. He takes part in the synod of the Roman Catholic clergy at Thurles in 1850.
Towards the end of his life, Murray’s eyesight is impaired, and he reads and writes with difficulty. Among his last priestly functions is a funeral service for Richard Lalor Sheil who had died in Italy, and whose body had been brought back to Ireland for burial. Murray dies in Dublin on February 26, 1852, at the age of eighty-four. He is interred in the St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral, Dublin, where a marble statue of him has been erected in connection with a monument to his memory, executed by James Farrell, president of the Royal Hibernian Academy of Fine Arts.
(Pictured: Portrait of Daniel Murray, Archbishop of Dublin, by unknown 19th century Irish portrait painter)
MacSwiney is one of eight children of John and Mary MacSwiney. His father had volunteered in 1868 to fight as a papal guard against Giuseppe Garibaldi, had been a schoolteacher in London and later opened a tobacco factory in Cork. Following the failure of this business, John MacSwiney emigrates to Australia in 1885, leaving the children in the care of their mother and his eldest daughter.
MacSwiney is educated by the Christian Brothers at the North Monastery school in Cork, but leaves at fifteen to help support the family. He becomes an accountancy clerk but continues his studies and matriculates successfully. He continues in full-time employment while he studies at the Royal University (now University College Cork), graduating with a degree in Mental and Moral Science in 1907.
In 1901 MacSwiney helps to found the Celtic Literary Society, and in 1908 he founds the Cork Dramatic Society with Daniel Corkery and writes a number of plays for them. His first play, The Last Warriors of Coole, is produced in 1910. His fifth play, The Revolutionist (1915), takes the political stand made by a single man as its theme.
Described as a sensitive poet-intellectual, MacSwiney’s writings in the newspaper Irish Freedom bring him to the attention of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. He is one of the founders of the Cork Brigade of the Irish Volunteers in 1913, and is President of the Cork branch of Sinn Féin. He founds a newspaper, Fianna Fáil, in 1914, but it is suppressed after only eleven issues. In April 1916, he is intended to be second in command of the Easter Rising in counties Cork and Kerry, but stands down his forces on the order of Eoin MacNeill.
In the 1918 Irish general election, MacSwiney is returned unopposed to the first Dáil Éireann as Sinn Féin representative for Mid Cork, succeeding the Nationalist MP D. D. Sheehan. After the murder of his friend Tomás Mac Curtain, the Lord Mayor of Cork, on March 20, 1920, he is elected as Lord Mayor. On August 12, 1920, he is arrested in Cork for possession of “seditous articles and documents,” and also possession of a cipher key. He is summarily tried by a court on August 16 and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment at Brixton Prison in England.
In prison MacSwiney immediately starts a hunger strike in protest of his internment and the fact that he was tried by a military court. Eleven other Irish Republican prisoners in Cork Jail go on hunger strike at the same time. On August 26, the British Government states that “the release of the Lord Mayor would have disastrous results in Ireland and would probably lead to a mutiny of both military and police in south of Ireland.”
MacSwiney’s hunger strike gains world attention. The British Government is threatened with a boycott of British goods by Americans, while four countries in South America appeal to Pope Benedict XV to intervene. Protests are held in Germany and France as well. An Australian member of Parliament, Hugh Mahon, is expelled from the Parliament of Australia for “seditious and disloyal utterances at a public meeting,” after protesting against the actions of the British Government. Two weeks later, the Spanish Catalan organization Autonomous Center of Employees of Commerce and Industry (CADCI) sends a petition to British Prime MinisterDavid Lloyd George calling for his release and the newspaper of the organization, Acció (Acción in Spanish), begins a campaign for MacSwiney.
Food is often placed near MacSwiney to persuade him to give up the hunger strike. Attempts at force-feeding are undertaken in the final days of his strike. On October 20, 1920 he slips into a coma and dies in London’s Brixton Prison on October 25, after 73 days on hunger strike. His body lay in St. George’s Cathedral, Southwark in London where 30,000 people file past it. Fearing large-scale demonstrations in Dublin, the authorities divert his coffin directly to Cork, and his funeral in the Cathedral of St. Mary and St. Anne on October 31 attracts huge crowds. He is buried in the Republican plot in St. Finbarr’s Cemetery in Cork. Arthur Griffith delivers the graveside oration. His death brings him and the Irish Republican campaign to international attention.
Traynor is born into a strongly nationalist family in Dublin. He is educated by the Christian Brothers. In 1899, he is apprenticed to John Long, a famous wood-carver. As a young man he is a noted footballer and tours Europe as a goalkeeper with Belfast Celtic F.C. whom he plays with from 1910 to 1912. He rejects claims soccer is a foreign sport calling it “a Celtic game, pure and simple, having its roots in the Highlands of Scotland.”
When the Irish Civil War breaks out in June 1922, Traynor takes the Anti-Treaty IRA side. The Dublin Brigade is split, however, with many of its members following Michael Collins in taking the pro-Treaty side. During the Battle of Dublin he is in charge of the Barry’s Hotel garrison, before making their escape. He organises guerilla activity in south Dublin and County Wicklow, before being captured by Free State troops in September. He is then imprisoned for the remainder of the war.
In 1936, Traynor is first appointed to the Cabinet as Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. In September 1939, he is appointed Minister for Defence and holds the portfolio to February 1948. In 1948, he becomes President of the Football Association of Ireland, a position he holds until his death. He serves as Minister for Defence in several Fianna Fáil governments and as Minister for Justice, where he is undermined by his junior minister, and later Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, before he retires in 1961.
Traynor dies in Dublin at the age of 77 on December 15, 1963. He has a road named in his memory, running from the Malahide Road through Coolock to Santry in Dublin’s northern suburbs.
(Pictured: Minister for Defence Oscar Traynor at his desk, June 1940)
Dalton is born to Irish American parents James F. and Katharine L. Dalton. The family moves back to Ireland when he is two years old. He grows up in a middle-class Catholic background in Drumcondra in North Dublin and lives at No. 8 Upper St. Columba’s Road. He is educated by the Christian Brothers at O’Connell School in North Richmond Street. He joins the nationalist militia, the Irish Volunteers, in 1913 and the following year, though only fifteen, is involved in the smuggling of arms into Ireland.
Dalton joins the British Army in 1915 for the duration of the Great War. His decision is not that unusual among Irish Volunteers, as over 20,000 of the National Volunteers join the British New Army on the urgings of Nationalist leader John Redmond. His father, however, disagrees with his son’s decision. He initially joins the 7th battalion of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers (RDF) as a temporary 2nd Lieutenant. By 1916 he is attached to the 9th Battalion, RDF, 16th (Irish) Division under Major-General William Hickie, which contains many Irish nationalist recruits.
During the Battle of the Somme in September 1916, Dalton is involved in bloody fighting during the Battle of Ginchy, in which over 4,000 Irishmen are killed or wounded. He is awarded the Military Cross for his conduct in the battle. Afterwards he is transferred to the 6th Battalion, Leinster Regiment, and sent to Thessaloniki then Palestine, where he commands a company and then supervises a sniper school in el-ʻArīsh. In 1918 he is re-deployed again to France, and in July promoted to captain, serving as an instructor.
On demobilisation in April 1919, Dalton returns to Ireland. There, finding that his younger brother Charlie had joined the IRA, he himself follows suit. He later comments on the apparent contradiction of fighting both with and against the British Army by saying that he had fought for Ireland with the British and fought for Ireland against them.
Dalton follows Collins in accepting the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1922 and is one of the first officers, a Major General, in the new National Army established by the Irish Provisional Government of the Irish Free State. The Treaty is opposed by much of the IRA and Civil War between pro and anti-treaty factions eventually results.
Dalton is in command of troops assaulting the Four Courts in the Battle of Dublin which marks the start of the war in June 1922. At Collins’ instigation he, as Military liaison officer with the British during the truce, takes control of the two 18 pounder guns from the British that are trained on the buildings. He becomes commander of the Free State Army under Richard Mulcahy‘s direction. He is behind the Irish Free State offensive of July–August 1922 that dislodges the Anti-Treaty fighters from the towns of Munster. He proposes seaborne landings to take the Anti-Treaty positions from the rear and he commands one such naval landing that takes Cork in early August. In spite of firm loyalty to the National Army, he is critical of the Free State’s failure to follow up its victory, allowing the Anti-Treaty IRA to regroup resuming the guerrilla warfare started in 1919.
On August 22, 1922, he accompanies Collins in convoy, touring rural west Cork. The convoy is ambushed near Béal na Bláth and Collins is killed in the firefight. He had advised Collins to drive on, but Collins, who is not an experienced combat veteran, insists on stopping to fight.
Dalton is married shortly afterwards, on October 9, 1922, to Alice Shannon in Cork’s Imperial Hotel. By December 1922 he has resigned his command in the Army. He does not agree with the execution of republican prisoners that mark the latter stages of the Civil War. After briefly working as clerk of the Irish Senate, Seanad Éireann, he leaves the job to work in the movie industry.
Dalton dies in his daughter Nuala’s house in Dublin on March 4, 1978, his 80th birthday, never having seen the film that Cathal O’Shannon of RTÉ had made on his life. During the making of the film they visit the battlefields in France, Kilworth Camp in Cork, Béal Na Bláth, and other places that Dalton had not visited since his earlier years. He wishes to be buried as near as possible to his friend Michael Collins in Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin and is buried there in March 1978 after a military funeral. None of the ruling Fianna Fáil government ministers or TDs attend.
(Pictured: Dalton photographed in lieutenant’s uniform, Royal Dublin Fusiliers, taken circa. 1914-1918)
Gregory becomes involved in republican politics, joining Sinn Féin and the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in 1964. In UCD he helps found the UCD Republican Club, despite pressure from college authorities, and becomes involved with the Dublin Housing Action Committee. Within the party he is a supporter of Wicklow Republican Seamus Costello. Costello, who is a member of Wicklow County Council, emphasises involvement in local politics and is an opponent of abstentionism. Gregory sides with the Officials in the 1970 split within Sinn Féin. Despite having a promising future within the party, he resigns in 1972 citing frustration with ideological infighting in the party. Later, Costello, who had been expelled by Official Sinn Féin, approaches him and asks him to join his new party, the Irish Republican Socialist Party. He leaves the party after Costello’s assassination in 1977. He is briefly associated with the Socialist Labour Party.
Gregory contests the 1979 local elections for Dublin City Council as a “Dublin Community Independent” candidate. At the February 1982 general election he is elected to Dáil Éireann as an Independent TD. On his election he immediately achieves national prominence through the famous “Gregory Deal,” which he negotiates with Fianna Fáil leader Charles Haughey. In return for supporting Haughey as Taoiseach, he is guaranteed a massive cash injection for his inner-city Dublin constituency, an area beset by poverty and neglect.
Although Gregory is reviled in certain quarters for effectively holding a government to ransom, his uncompromising commitment to the poor is widely admired. Fianna Fáil loses power at the November 1982 general election, and many of the promises made in the Gregory Deal are not implemented by the incoming Fine Gael–Labour Party coalition.
Gregory is involved in the 1980s in tackling Dublin’s growing drug problem. Heroin had largely been introduced to Dublin by the Dunne criminal group, based in Crumlin, in the late 1970s. In 1982 a report reveals that 10% of 15- to 24-year-olds have used heroin at least once in the north inner city. The spread of heroin use also leads to a sharp increase in petty crime. He confronts the government’s handling of the problem as well as senior Gardaí, for what he sees as their inadequate response to the problem. He co-ordinates with the Concerned Parents Against Drugs group in 1986, who protest and highlight the activities of local drug dealers, and defend the group against accusations by government Ministers Michael Noonan and Barry Desmond that it is a front for the Provisional IRA. He believes that the solution to the problem is multi-faceted and works on a number of policy level efforts across policing, service co-ordination and rehabilitation of addicts. In 1995 in an article in The Irish Times, he proposes what would later become the Criminal Assets Bureau, which is set up in 1996, catalysed by the death of journalistVeronica Guerin. His role in its development is later acknowledged by then Minister for JusticeNora Owen.
Gregory also advocates for Dublin’s street traders. After attending a sit-down protest with Sinn Féin Councillor Christy Burke, and future Labour Party TD Joe Costello on Dublin’s O’Connell Street in defence of a street trader, he, Burke and four others are arrested and charged with obstruction and threatening behaviour. He spends two weeks in Mountjoy Prison after refusing to sign a bond to keep the peace.
Gregory remains a TD from 1982 and, although he never holds a government position, remains one of the country’s most recognised Dáil deputies. He always refuses to wear a tie in the Dáil chamber stating that many of his constituents could not afford them.
Gregory dies on January 2, 2009, following a long battle with cancer. Following his death, tributes pour in from politicians from every party, recognising his contribution to Dublin’s north inner city. During his funeral, politicians from the Labour Party, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are told that although they speak highly of Gregory following his death, during his time in the Dáil he had been excluded by many of them and that they were not to use his funeral as a “photo opportunity.” He is buried on January 7, with the Socialist Party‘s Joe Higgins delivering the graveside oration.
Diarmuid O’Hegarty (Ó hÉigeartuigh), civil servant and revolutionary, is born Jeremiah Stephen Hegarty on December 26, 1892 in Lowertown, Skibbereen, County Cork, the eldest of seven children of Jeremiah Hegarty (1856–1934) and his wife Eileen (née Barry), both teachers. He is educated at the Christian Brothers school, St. Patrick’s Place, Cork, joins the civil service in 1910 and is posted to the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction, acquiring invaluable administrative experience as private secretary to T. P. Gill, secretary of the department.
O’Hegarty is a member of the Keating branch of the Gaelic League and the closely associated Teeling circle of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). In 1913 he becomes secretary and stage manager of a troupe of Gaelic players, Na hAisteoirí, which includes several who later become prominent revolutionaries: Piaras Béaslaí, Gearóid O’Sullivan, Fionán Lynch, and Con Collins. As second lieutenant of F Company, 1st Battalion, Dublin Brigade, Irish Volunteers, during the Easter Rising, he is in charge of barricades in Church Street, Mary Lane, Mary’s Abbey, and Jameson Distillery, an area which sees fierce fighting. Imprisoned in Knutsford (May 1-18), he is released in error and returns to his post in the civil service. On his return he is a key figure in the reorganisation of the Volunteers and IRB, becoming a member of the executive of the IRB’s supreme council along with Michael Collins and Seán Ó Murthuile. He also becomes a central figure in Kathleen Clarke‘s prisoner support group, the Irish Volunteer Dependents Fund, and when it amalgamates with the more moderate Irish National Aid Association to form the INA&VDF in August 1916, he helps to ensure that it is dominated by republicans.
O’Hegarty is very close to Michael Collins and Harry Boland and in 1918 this IRB triumvirate exercises considerable control in the nomination of Sinn Féin candidates for the 1918 Irish general election. In the same year he is dismissed from the civil service for refusing to take the oath of allegiance, but his administrative talents find ample outlet in the secretariat of the revolutionary Dáil and later in the service of the Irish Free State to such an extent that he has been called ‘the civil servant of the revolution’ and ‘the Grey Eminence of the Free State Government.’ As clerk of the First Dáil and secretary to the Dáil cabinet (1919–21), he is largely responsible for its success, organising meetings of the clandestine parliament and coordinating the work of various departments from his offices on the corner of O’Connell Street and Abbey Street and later in Middle Abbey Street. He is determined that the Dáil will demonstrate its worth by ‘functioning as any progressive government would be expected to function.’ He records the minutes and handles all correspondence of the Dáil cabinet. As the conduit through which the Dáil’s ministers communicate, his role is central to the effective operation of government on the run. The influence this gives him within the revolutionary movement is bolstered by his senior role within the IRB and the positions of military significance which he occupies. He is a member of the Volunteer Executive (Jun 1916–Nov 1921), Irish Republican Army (IRA) Director of Communications (Jul 1918–Mar 1920), and Director of Organisation (Mar 1920–Apr 1921). When convicted of illegal assembly and jailed in Mountjoy Prison (Nov 1919–Feb 1920), he immediately wields power within the prison, ordering Noel Lemass off a hunger strike.
O’Hegarty resigns his military duties in April 1921 to concentrate on his work in the Dáil secretariat and serves as secretary to the Irish delegation during the Anglo–Irish Treaty negotiations in London (Oct–Dec 1921). He is a vital voice for the Treaty within the IRB and is appointed secretary to the cabinet of the Provisional Government in 1922, participating in the unsuccessful army unification talks of May 1922. During the Irish Civil War he is briefly seconded from his civil service post to serve as military governor of Mountjoy Prison (Jul-Aug 1922), where he threatens that prisoners who persist in leaning out of windows and talking to the public outside the prison will be shot. Peadar O’Donnell, who is a prisoner there at the time, remembers him as the focus of much ‘republican bitterness.’ A member of the army council during the Irish Civil War, he serves as Director of Organisation (Jul–Dec 1922) and Director of Intelligence (Dec 1922–May 1923), leaving the army with the rank of lieutenant general on May 1, 1923 to resume his civil service career.
O’Hegarty is secretary to the Executive Council of the Irish Free State (1923–32) and principal private secretary to its president, W. T. Cosgrave. Again he records the cabinet minutes and is the administrative pivot upon which government turns. He serves as secretary to numerous governmental delegations and is widely praised for his work in this role at the 1926 Imperial Conference and the 1930 Imperial Conference. In 1927 he goes to New York to represent the government at a hearing into the fate of republican funds in the United States. His career is the prime example of the influence of revolutionary veterans within the higher civil service in the early years of the state. After the change of government following the 1932 Irish general election, he is one of the very few senior civil servants who is effectively removed from his position. He is appointed to be a commissioner of public works, becoming chairman in 1949, a position he holds until his retirement in 1957. In 1939–40 he serves on the Economy Committee established by the government to advise on wartime spending, and in 1941 is a member of a tribunal of inquiry into public transport, which is principally concerned with the poor financial state of Great Southern Railways.
On April 27, 1922, with Michael Collins as his best man, O’Hegarty marries Claire Archer, daughter of Edward Archer, a post office telegraph inspector from Dublin, and Susan Archer (née Matthews). Her brother is William (Liam) Archer. They live at 9 Brendan Road, Donnybrook, Dublin.
Michael Fitzgerald also known as Mick Fitzgerald, dies on hunger strike in Cork County Gaol on October 17, 1920. He is among the first members of the Irish Republican Army and plays an important role in organizing it. His death is credited with bringing world-wide attention to the Irish cause for independence.
Born in December 1881 in Ballyoran, Fermoy, County Cork, Fitzgerald is educated at the Christian Brothers School in the town and subsequently finds work as a mill worker in the locality. He joins the Irish Volunteers in 1914 and plays an important role in building the local organisation which is soon to become the Irish Republican Army (IRA). He soon rises to the rank of Battalion Commandant, 1st Battalion, Cork No.2 Brigade.
On Easter Sunday, April 20, 1919, Fitzgerald leads a small group of IRA volunteers who capture Araglin, Cork Royal Irish Constabulary Barracks located on the border with County Tipperary. He is subsequently arrested and sentenced to three months imprisonment at Cork County Gaol. He is released from prison in August 1919 and immediately returns to active IRA duty. He is involved in the holding up of a party of British Army troops at the Wesleyan Church in Fermoy. The troops are disarmed although one of them is killed. Arrested and held on remand, Fitzgerald feels that the only chance he has for release is via a hunger strike.
Fitzgerald, along with Terence MacSwiney and nine other IRA volunteers, are arrested on August 8, 1920. On August 11, MacSwiney begins a hunger strike in Brixton Gaol. Fitzgerald and the other nine volunteers at Cork County Gaol join in. At the age of 24, he is the first to die on October 17, 1920 as a result of his sixty-seven day fast. His death is followed by the deaths of Joe Murphy and Terence MacSwiney. Their deaths are credited with bringing world-wide attention to the Irish cause for independence.
Fitzgerald is buried at Kilcrumper Cemetery, on the outskirts of Fermoy, County Cork. In addition, a road is named after him in Togher, Cork.
During a November 2008 visit to Fermoy, Sinn Féin Vice-President Pat Doherty lays a wreath at Fitzgerald’s grave. Doherty says Fitzgerald’s sacrifice was like that of the hunger strikers in 1981. He says it is a great honour for him to pay homage to a man “to whom we owe so much.” Also buried in the Republican Plot in Fermoy is General Liam Lynch, who was Chief of Staff of the IRA when he was shot dead by Irish Free State troops in the Knockmealdown Mountains on April 12, 1923. His last wish was to be buried with his great friend and comrade, Mick Fitzgerald.
McCreevy is educated locally at Naas by the Congregation of Christian Brothers, and later at the fee paying Franciscan Gormanston College. He studies Commerce at University College Dublin and goes on to become a chartered accountant. His family background is modest, his father and ancestors since the late 18th century are lock-keepers on the Grand Canal, a job carried on by his mother after the death of his father, when McCreevy is four years old.
McCreevy’s political career begins with when he wins a seat in the Kildare constituency at the 1977 Irish general election, which is a landslide for Charles Haughey‘s supporters in Fianna Fáil and he is re-elected at every subsequent election until he joins the European Commission. Between 1979 and 1985, he serves as an elected member of the Kildare County Council.
In the 1979 Fianna Fáil leadership election, McCreevy strongly supports the controversial Charles Haughey, who narrowly wins the post. However, in a time of severe budgetary difficulties for Ireland, he soon becomes disillusioned with the new Taoiseach and his fiscal policies. In October 1982, he launches a motion of no-confidence in the party leader, which evolves into a leadership challenge by Desmond O’Malley. In an open ballot and supported by only 21 of his 79 colleagues, the motion fails and McCreevy is temporarily expelled from the parliamentary party.
In later years O’Malley is expelled from Fianna Fáil itself and forms the Progressive Democrats (PDs), espousing conservative fiscal policies. Although considered ideologically close to the PDs, and a personal friend of its erstwhile leader, Mary Harney, McCreevy chooses to remain a member of Fianna Fáil, where he eventually serves in joint FF-PD Governments.
For his first 15 years as TD, while Haughey remains leader, McCreevy remains a backbencher. In 1992, Albert Reynolds becomes Taoiseach and McCreevy is appointed Minister for Social Welfare. In this role, he is principally remembered for a set of 12 cost-cutting measures, collectively termed the “dirty dozen”, which are arguably minor in their direct impact but provide a major political headache for his party in the 1992 Irish general election.
In 1993, McCreevy becomes Minister for Tourism, Transport and Communication, which he holds until the government falls in December 1994. In opposition under new Fianna Fáil leader Bertie Ahern, he is appointed Opposition Spokesperson for Finance. In this role he is viewed as actively pro-enterprise, anti-spending and a key advocate for tax cuts.
In 1997, Fianna Fáil returns to power and McCreevy becomes Minister for Finance. His period coincides with the era of the “Celtic Tiger,” which sees the rapid growth of the Irish economy due to social partnership between employers, government and unions, increased female participation in the labour force, decades of tuition-free secondary education, targeting of foreign direct investment, a low corporation tax rate, an English-speaking workforce only five time-zones from New York City, and membership of the European Union – which provides payments for infrastructural development, export access to the European Single Market and a Eurozone country. He is a consistent advocate of cutting taxes and spending.
In 2004, McCreevy is selected by the Government of Ireland to replace David Byrne as Ireland’s European Commissioner. He is appointed to the Internal Market and Services portfolio, by President of the European CommissionJosé Manuel Barroso. At his confirmation hearings in the European Parliament MEPs describe him as “fluent and relaxed.” He also informs them that he has campaigned for the ratification of every European Treaty since 1972.
In October 2007, McCreevy, commenting on the Northern Rock bank’s loss of investor confidence, claims that banking regulations in the UK, which forces banks to be open to scrutiny from outside investors, caused the panic. He says if access to the banks dealings had been restricted, then the trouble could have been avoided.
Irish constitutional law requires a referendum to alter the constitution for such a major change as the adoption of the Treaty of Lisbon. Interviewed beforehand, McCreevy says that he has not read the Treaty in full himself, though he understands and endorses it. The referendum is held on June 12, 2008 and the Irish electorate does not approve the Treaty. He is heavily criticised in the European Parliament and by the leader of the Socialist group in the European Parliament, Martin Schulz, who demands on June 17, 2008, that McCreevy be removed as a European Commissioner. Schulz slightly misquotes McCreevy, whom he stated had contributed to Ireland’s rejection of the Treaty of Lisbon with remarks during the referendum campaign that no “sane person” would read the document.
Following McCreevy’s departure from the commission, he is forced to resign from the board of a new banking firm, NBNK Investments, after an EU ethics committee finds a conflict of interest with his work as a European Commissioner in charge of financial regulation.
McNamara retains his seat at the 1966 general election, and at subsequent elections until the constituency is abolished for the February 1974 general election, when he transfers to the new Kingston upon Hull Central constituency. When that constituency is abolished for the 1983 election, he is re-elected for the re-created Kingston upon Hull North constituency.
During the 2005 general election campaign McNamara claims some of the policies regarding illegal travelers’ sites of the leader of the Conservative Party, Michael Howard, had a “whiff of the gas chambers” about them. Howard’s grandmother died at Auschwitz.
McNamara is known throughout his parliamentary career as a supporter of Irish nationalism and favours a United Ireland. After entering parliament, he soon becomes interested in reports of discrimination against the Catholic minority in Northern Ireland and supports the Campaign for Democracy in Ulster (CDU). He serves as a frontbench spokesman for the Labour Party, including Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland under Neil Kinnock, 1987–94, an appointment that is widely criticised by Unionists.
After Tony Blair becomes Labour leader, he replaces McNamara as Northern Ireland spokesman with Mo Mowlam. In 1997, he helps persuade the newly elected Labour government to donate £5,000 (thereby matching the contribution of the Irish government) for the erection of a memorial in Liverpool to the victims of the Great Irish Famine. He also supports Republicanism in the United Kingdom and joins the All-Party Parliamentary Republic Group.
McNamara is a Roman Catholic and a Knight of the Pontifical Order of Saint Gregory the Great. He is married to Nora McNamara, and is the father of four sons and a daughter.
In 2006, McNamara receives the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws from the University of Hull in recognition of his long service in politics. He graduates with a Ph.D from the University of Liverpool in 2007 having completed a thesis on the MacBride Principles at the Institute of Irish Studies, where he gives the 2008 John Kennedy Lecture in Irish Studies, Perhaps It Will All Go Away – an Examination of the British Response to the Civil Rights Movement in Northern Ireland.
In 2017, McNamara is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer while on holiday in Spain. He dies on August 6, 2017 at Formby, England, at the age of 82.
seamus dubhghaill 