Peter CostelloExamining the National Archives
Under the 30 year rule governing the release of official documents, the National Archives has made files relating to 1983 available to the general public.
The year 1983 opened with the reported tapping of the telephones of noted journalists Bruce Arnold and Geraldine Kennedy, which resulted in the resignation of several senior Garda officers including the commissioner, and the tainting of others in public office by association.
The belief that the security services regularly tapped phones was a well established one in the country, especially in radical and Republican circles. These taps were thought to be for security reasons, in the campaign against seditious groups for instance. That they affected ordinary citizens too, for party political reasons rather than security, was a disturbing revelation.
But other controversies ran throughout the year: the fierce debates over the Pro-Life Amendment to the Constitution, matters of law reform relating to marriage and rape, and a visit by President Robert Mugabe, which led to exchanges which angered the imperious African leader.
But among these stories of the year are others of historical interest revealing how different attitudes were then to the relations between Church and State.
Some of these we will glance at in the following pages, but first a warning.
Open Government or a Culture of Secrecy?
In previous years one of the prime sources of interesting stories of what went on behind the scenes at the highest levels of Church and State were the reports and correspondence of the Irish Ambassador to the Holy See.
We found these a rich source of information, not so much on the Vatican itself – though that was true – but on political and social matters ranging literally from China to Peru.
This year no files were released relating to the Vatican.
Could there a connection perhaps with the abolition of the Irish embassy to the Vatican?
Asked about this one of the senior staff remarked smilingly that it was not a matter of conspiracy, but of staff shortages due to the Government cut backs.
The Department of Foreign Affairs simply does not have the time, or the staff, or even or the energy, to survey all the diplomatic files before handing them over to the National Archives for the public to read.
This goes to the heart of this annual exercise in supposed ‘open government’. Rather than being a matter of transparency in public life, very often the annual release of files involves a culture of continuing secrecy on the part of the civil service.
In any case, only the files of a very limited range of departments are involved in these releases. The most important are the Department of the Taoiseach, Foreign Affairs, Justice, and the President’s office, with occasional files from elsewhere.
Naturally those from the Taoiseach’s office cover all areas of government concern and so go some way to providing a birds-eye view of the year. But no security files, no Department of Health files, nothing from a whole range of ministries.
In time these will come. But not before they have been regularly weeded in the departments, re-weeded before transfer, and even then further examinations are made of the files for any papers which might cause legal and libel difficulties.
A constant feature of the files over the years is the insertion of notices of exclusion by the Archive staff that various documents are still being kept back.
So don’t get carried away with the idea, which other media sources may promote, that all State secrets can be discovered by visiting Bishop Street. This is not true. And given the nature of democracy will never be true.
The truth in history is a matter for historians, not civil servants, or even journalists.
Echoes of past scandals
Often among the many files relating to a particular year there are also released files that relate to earlier years, some going back to the foundation of the State. The earliest documents in this year’s files is one relating to the theft of the so called Irish Crown Jewels in 1907, but two other sensations of the past also cast up new information.
The IRA Raid on the Magazine Fort (1939)
In the late 1930s the IRA, a proscribed organisation, was in an active phase of its history. Then with a largely left-wing outlook it was fresh from struggle with the right-wing Blue Shirts of General O’Duffy, and there were those anxious once again to take the war for the liberation of Ireland to the enemy, which they would do by joining Nazi Germany in ‘declaring war’ on Britain with a mainland bombing campaign.
A preliminary to this was a raid conducted on the military arsenal held in Magazine Fort in the Phoenix Park (a site which oddly enough was a running theme in James Joyce’s soon to be published novel Finnegans Wake). This was on December 23, 1939.
This raid was a great embarrassment to De Valera’s Government and led to the disciplining of army officers. But with the coming of the Emergency and the IRA bombing campaign in England (in which Brendan Behan was arrested) larger issues took the concern of the Government and people.
Secret files
In the 1970s historians began to turn back to these events. The now celebrated foreign correspondent Robert Fiske, then writing a PhD thesis at Trinity College in Dublin, applied to see the secret files relating to the raid on the Magazine Fort as part of his study of war-time Ireland. He was refused.
The matter re-emerged, however, in 1983, when the widow of Col. McCorley, with a special interest in the matter, applied for personal reason. Her son was now an officer in the army and she wished to have her husband’s name fully cleared from the taint of past suspicion.
This matter was discussed at a high level. Could the file (ref. no S11636) be released? After all the raid was 45 years in the past. But again the army were adamant. Their reasons are interesting.
The file was part of a number due to have be sent to the National Archives as part of the files for the period 1948-1951. Some 10 files were held back on security grounds by Defence, of which the Magazine raid was one. “The file was withheld because of strong objections from the Department of Defence. The request for the file now [April 1983] is that it would be for the Minister’s and Secretary’s eyes only.”
The file and many others from the period of the Emergency are still withheld. [File 2013 /100/ 55]
The More O’Ferral Estate (1970)
Another incident in the IRA campaigns of the 1930s, which were much involved with social and agrarian issues, was the murder of one of the More OíFerral family during the course of a local dispute over rents and the redistribution of land. It was the shooting of Richard More OíFerrall at Lisard, Co. Longford, in 1935 that led in part to banning of the IRA.
He was murdered by men who broke into the family mansion during a dinner party, shot him dead and wounded his father. (A dinner guest, the architect Michael Scott, then a young man, was said to have thrown himself under the table to protect himself from the bullets.)
A file on More OíFerral lands is among the new releases. In 1979 Roderic More OíFerrall who ran a stud at Kildangan, near Monasterevan in Kildare, got in touch with his friend Charles Haughey about the possibility of the National Stud taking over his estate and stud as an addition to their holdings in Kildare.
There is a long history in Ireland post-1922 of great families trying to persuade the State to relieve them of burdensome properties.
Mr Haughey seems to have been agreeable to the idea; horse flesh was a matter of great interest to him in both his public and private life. However, the Board of Works and other civil servants are revealed to have been far from keen. The National Stud, which still needed State support, was already over supplied with acres for its horses, and the additional costs made the scheme prohibitive. Haughey left office. Nothing came of the scheme.
So ironically lands which were part of a family estate that a generation before had been thought worth murdering over so that they could be divided among the local small farmers, was now found to be a mere burden on the public purse.
The Kildangan estate was eventually sold to Sheikh Mohammed al-Maktoum.
So in half a century the social outlook of modern Ireland had altered.
The Theft of the Irish Crown Jewels (1907)
The oldest of these scandals was the mystery surrounding the purloining of the regalia of the Master of the Order of St Patrick from Dublin Castle shortly before the official visit of King Edward in which a further inauguration of Knights of St Patrick was planned for St Patrick’s Cathedral.
This crime is one of the perennial mysteries of Irish history. Officially the blame was placed on the narrow shoulders of the Chief Herald Sir Arthur Vicars, who fought over the remaining years of his life before his murder by the IRA, that he has been victimised to assuage the king’s anger.
Scandals
The actual thief was Francis Shackleton (the brother of the polar explorer) and his friend, a Captain Gorges. There were at the time, and in many later accounts of the affair, a swirl of homosexual scandals with gossip about all male parties in Vicars’ Clonskeagh home and in the Bedford Tower of Dublin Castle.
At one of the events Vicars’ keys to the offices in the Castle were purloined, copied, and made use of to remove the jewels days before they were to be called out for the king’s visit.
Vicars was dismissed from his position, but no-one was charged with the actual crime, nor were the jewels recovered. Rumours were current over the years that they had been offered to the Free State government, but this remains a cloudy issue too.
The matter came before the public in 1982 when the full text of Vicars will which had been closed by the action of a former director of the State Paper Office Diarmuid Coffey was released. In fact it added nothing to what was known for the text had been quoted from private sources by the authors of Vicious Circle.
But in the whole story of the theft the interest lies not so much in the identity of the thieves. But in the action of the former British rulers in Dublin castle, of the Free State in being less than frank about approaches made to it in 1927 to buy back the jewels, and the manner in which the personal lives of staff were manipulated either to protect the powerful or to denigrate the weak.
Controversy arose in 1976 over an article by the curator of the Garda Museum which claims that the Irish government had bought the jewels. The Earl of Granard, whose father had wanted the Order of St Patrick to be revived by the Free State, was bothered enough to make private contact with Liam Cosgrave over the matter.
Concern
This caused some concern in the Taoiseach’s department, as it was Liam Cosgrave’s father who was said to have authorised the jewels purchase through an intermediary from Francis Shackleton in 1927.
Then in September 1983 the matter again erupted with a fanciful search of a site in the Dublin Mountains as the result of a tip off to the guards.
But once again little light was cast on the mystery, and the papers on file suggest the Irish authorities, uncertain about what the truth might be, were just as glad this was the case.
The tendency of officials to ‘cover-up’ and to blame an outsider is fully displayed.
On aspect of the new releases is the light they shine on Church/State relations as they were in former decades of the Irish State. This is illustrated by two files from the current crop:
St Laurence O’Toole: The 800th Anniversary of his Death at Eu
One big event not just for the city of Dublin, but the Catholic Church in Ireland and in France, were the celebrations to mark the 800th anniversary of the death of St Laurence OíToole in Eu in northern France in May 1981.
He had been on his way as a papal legate to meet with Henry II when he fell ill at Eu and died. His canonisation followed very quickly, and he became an important figure in the history of the little town.
Private approach
This town was also associated with the Orleans French Royal family (which still has its many ardent adherents among ultraconservative Catholics in the French Republic). Hence Madame La Comtesse de Paris, the widow of the former pretender to the throne of France, was much involved with the celebrations. It was her private approach to the Irish Ambassador in Paris that led to the extension of an invitation, sent through the ambassador, for Archbishop Dermot Ryan to attend the celebrations with a party from Dublin.
The files show that these arrangements were the outcome of much contact of a private nature at the highest levels, especially on the part of the Department of Foreign Affairs. One wonders if the department under its current masters would be so generous.
French customs
The Archbishop of Dublin planned to take with him some silver objects as gifts to La Comtesse de Paris and others in Eu. The department had to prepare a special document to enable him to carry these through the French customs.
In the event the pilgrimage was a great success. Some 300 people attended, supported by various Irish cultural events including poems in Irish and English and the Army Pipe Band. (A sum of £2600 was voted to cover the band travel, though Dr ” Danachair, the noted folklorist, objected as ìboth the instruments they used and the garb they wore were not Irishî.)
Dr Ryan generously made a donation of £5,000 towards the cost of the restoration of the Chapel of St Laurence OíToole on the hill above the town.
In due course when Madame La Comtesse de Paris came to Ireland that September as the guest of Madame Catherine Weygand at Hume Wood, Dr Ryan was invited there to meet her.
In the light of current attitudes it is revealing just how much support the Irish diplomatic service then gave to supporting Irish cultural and quasi-religious events in other countries.
De Valera’s friend Cardinal Cushing
Ireland in the minds of many Irish-Americans is a sort of rural background to the city of Boston; certainly the relations between the city and the nation have always be strong, involving ties of family, politics and religion. Boston, too, was the fiefdom of the Kennedys, which made it even more important in the eyes of many Irish people.
In the early 1960s, aside from JFK himself, the most eminent and admired Bostonian was Cardinal Richard Cushing. In 1962 the Irish embassy in Washington DC urgently cabled the Department of Foreign Affairs, to pass on to President De Valera the information that the cardinal was to undergo a serious operation.
De Valera responded at once. Through his staff and the department he arranged for a telegram of good wishes and flowers to be delivered to the hospital.
“I am very distressed by the news of your illness. The Irish people join me in prayer for your early recovery so that you may continue your valiant work for God in the service of mankind.”
Ominous news from the ambassador preceded the operation. “The prognosis is understood to be uncertain and feared unfavourable.” It seems that the cancer was more deeply seated than had been thought.
De Valera prepared to hear the worst. But providentially in the eyes of some, the cardinal survived the operation and seemed recovered in his health.
Schemes
So much so that he became involved in the schemes surrounding the erection of the extraordinary new Catholic cathedral in Galway city – the capital of the region indeed from which many of the citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts had derived since the Famine.
Cardinal Cushing donated the huge sum of £60,000 to the building fund. But more than that, the by now frail prelate travelled in person to attend to dedication ceremonies, where he met de Valera.
Again these were matters which caused great flurries of personal intervention by the president and the department.
However, soon after the cardinal’s health again began to decline. He died on November 2, 1970.
Personal tribute
President de Valera, who had always valued the support he personally and his political party, let alone the Irish nation, had received from Boston, was moved again to pay a warm personal tribute to him the next day. “For many of us, indeed, his name and that of Boston were almost synonymous. Ar dheis Dé go raibh sé.”
But then those were the days when public figures such as De Valera could invoke without irony the ideals of Catholic Ireland.
Ireland and the UN’s ‘Parish Church’
A set of papers cast an interesting light on the attitude of the Irish Government and the Department of Foreign affairs to supporting religious activities abroad.
In 1964 a priest of the New York diocese, an energetic young man named Msgr Timothy Flynn, with a great deal of PR and media experience, began the development of a church on a site opposite the United Nations which was intended to be a “parish church” for Catholics among the various national missions to the UN.
Monsignor Flynn naturally enough approached Frederick Boland the Irish Ambassador to the United Nations to seek the support of the Irish mission. Aside from the church there was to be a separate facility, the Pacem in Terris Library, a centre for studies relating to international affairs and peace-making, as well as a residence for the Holy See’s Permanent Observer at the UN.
When this matter was referred back to Dublin difficulties rose. A little earlier, in connection with a request for assistance to the Cultural Relations Committee of the Department of Foreign Affairs, the legal advice had been sought of the then attorney-general relating to giving such support in the light of the constitutional ban on subventing any particular religion in Ireland.
Rigid view
The attorney-general took a very rigid view of this, and said nothing could be given to support religious activity. But it was thought in the department that cultural matters might be different.
Disappointed
Monsignor Flynn was a little disappointed. It seemed from private conversations that he had hoped for more books focused on international affairs and peace-making.
But as the ambassador, Cornelius Cremin, explained to Dublin in January 1966: “I told Monsignor Flynn that the volume of Catholic writing on these subjects in Ireland was not great and that we would undoubtedly experience some difficulties in putting a list together. However, I undertook to look into the question of a possible donation of back numbers of Studies, and/or a subscription to that quarterly, as well as any donations of similar Catholic social publications that might be possible.”
The situation was different with the regard to the South American missions. Some of those countries, such as Argentina, had a positive constitutional demand to support the Catholic Church. But Ireland it was admitted was bound by its more European constitution.
Cash donation
Monsignor Flynn had been hoping for a large cash donation perhaps, certainly items that would furnish the church.
But instead of stained glass windows, or carvings, the Irish mission donated a small collection of 16 representative books about Ireland, and paid the subscriptions to several journals including Studies, The Furrow, and Eire-Ireland, a purely cultural journal published in the US.
The appointment of a permanent observer by the Holy See was widely welcomed. It has in fact been suggested by U Thant, the UN secretary-general. But the Irish like, other missions, were very anxious that no ‘Catholic bloc’ should be created. It was much better that support for Monsignor Flynn and the centre be on a personal and informal basis.
Today the parish church of the United Nations still flourishes, and the remaining Catholic members of the Irish mission still attend Mass there.
Celebrating Columbus and the 500th anniversary of the ‘discovery of America’ – Ireland opposes in the name of St Brendan
In 1982 a full decade in advance, efforts were made for the celebration of the ‘discovery’ of America by Christopher Columbus.
This was a scheme much promoted not just by Spain, but also by Italy, with the support of many Latin counties.
However, it also, in this post-colonial era, ran into objections.
The Irish mission thought it premature. And in remarks made to the UN (well covered by background documents just released), while not wanting to sound too nationalistic, put forward the claim that the continent of north America had been reached by Irish explorers even before the Norse, who had general recognition as preceding Columbus.
The Columbus centenary was in any case a moment of cultural effusion which was deeply resented by the first nations of both North and South America. Ireland in this context had the distinction of being a pioneer, but one with no colonial baggage.
St Brendan, by merely visiting what he thought of as the ‘Promised Land of the Saints’ set the right note.
Independence for St Helena – the Irish view
Irelandís position at the UN of being a neutral Western nation with a ëcolonisedí past brought it an odd request at this time. An appeal was made by left-wing elements on the remote island of St Helena ñ where Napoleon had been exiled with his Irish doctor and a small staff after his defeat at Waterloo.
This group was campaigning for full independence for the island, and a breaking of the link as an overseas territory administered by the Colonial Office in London.
Their position paper on this had, however, been ridiculed in a slightly silly way by the British governor of the island, who generally poo-pooed any idea that such a tiny place could in any real sense become independent.
To its credit the Irish mission supported the independence, but this was in keeping with the general stance of the mission to support the newly emerging nations, largely in Africa, in any way they could. But perhaps in the process of decolonisation ëIndependence for St Helenaí was a step too far.
The changing face of religion in Ulster
Northern Ireland has always been a region beset by demographics. This was true in the past, when the State was founded, true today when a power sharing administration rules. But it is a sensitive issue.
In 1981 a census was held in Northern Ireland, this was beset with difficulties as in some districts there was opposition to a head count being made at all and it was quickly clear when the results were tabulated that there was a short fall in the numbers of Catholics counted. The results had to be revised upwards. But did they alter the balance? In August 1983 official Church figures, based on parish by parish surveys, suggested that the Catholic population was by then 42% of the population.
However, in April 1983 a civil servant, Paul McElhinery, prepared an internal paper entitled ‘Analysis of Religious Affiliation in Northern Ireland’. [This is contained in File 2013 /100 / 1107.]
Census
This drew on work done on the census returns by Paul Compton of Queen’s. He found that in his estimate 37.5% of the population was Catholic, compared with 62.5% Protestant. He concluded that any belief that the Catholic population would grow to outnumber the Protestant population was premature. Such a reversal could only be achieved well into the 22nd Century. He suggested the Catholic population would stabilise at about 43% – the sort of figure the Church survey already revealed.
This internal memo which was drawn up long before Sinn Féin overtook the SDLP as the major nationalist community party showed that status had been reached in Northern Ireland.
But there was one trend revealed in the census numbers which the document did not discuss.
This was the emergence of significant of ‘other and not-stated’. For instance, in these two districts:
Suffolk:
9,396 total, 6,750 Catholics, 10 assorted Protestants, and 2,636 not stated.
Orangefield:
6,801 total, had only 66 Catholics, 4,746 assorted Protestants, and 2,092 not stated.
The old tribalism was beginning to break down, with the advent of new communities (such as the Chinese, Indians and Africans) and with the growth of religious indifference. We can see the emerging results of this in the public life of Ulster today. Far from Catholics becoming a majority they might well become another kind of minority.
The crisis in the Irish language
Three weeks ago the current director of the Irish Language Commission announced his resignation to take effect in the New Year. He expressed his dismay at the lack of progress made in developing the use of the Irish language in the Civil Service – and by extension it was to be understood in Irish life in general.
But this crisis is not a new thing, Celtic Cassandras have been prophesying the death of the language since the 1920s, and yet it has hung on. But governments over the decades have been uncomfortably aware of the gap between official rhetoric on the question and whats actually being achieved.
Private thoughts
The newly released files reveal the private thoughts of the government and the civil service on this matter in relation to the Irish language, to Irish language publishing and also by extension the state of Irish publishing in general.
On June 14, 1983 Mr Sean MacMathúna, the Ard-Rúnaí of Conradh na Gaelige, had a meeting with the minster and his officials to discuss the future of the Irish language and the nature of government interventions across a wide spectrum to support it.
Afterwards a reply to his concerns had to be developed, and this was done by a civil servant named Peter Ryan. He drafted a long reply, to which was attached a schedule of the various schemes and what they might cost.
Reservation
Mr Ryan “had some reservation about this given the difficulties, especially financial, in meeting some of the targets e.g. establishment of an all Irish TV station. However I find it difficult to come up with an alternative satisfactory reply but I wonder whether it might be better at this stage for the Taoiseach to acknowledge the letter and to say that he is asking the Minister for the Gaeltacht, who was at the meeting, to reply to the specific points raised in the letter.”
This draft carries a note from another higher civil servant: “I agree with Mr Ryan. Tactically, the approach suggested at ‘x’ below [the passage quoted above] will permit most flexibility in the Gov’nts future polices on the language.”
Interventions
Among the interventions there seemed, however, to be no money for actually publishing books in the Irish language. That aspect of culture seemed to be neglected, even though the creative use of the language by a literary artist would be of the highest value in promoting the language.
The government was well aware of all the difficulties faced by Sáirséal agus Dill, the independent and enterprising Irish language publishers which had struggled from the 1940s to publish Irish books and to promoted an Irish language Book Club. It came into existence in direct reaction to the failures of the civil service run publisher An Gum, which, it was widely agreed, was a complete farce.
The state of the Irish language however contrasts with the general state of Irish publishing. The Minister of State at the Taoiseach’s department received an invitation to speak at the Listowel Writers’ Week Book Fair. A speech was drafted by the poet Anthony Cronin, who had provided the same sort of services for Charlie Haughey. In the end the minster did not go – peeved that the main event was to be opened by Senator Robb from Northern Ireland.
Huge stride
But Cronin’s draft speech lauded the huge stride being made by the Irish publishing industry, the evidence of which was to be seen at the fair. However a background briefing note reveals a different story. Lar Cassidy, the Literature Officer of the Arts Council, had told the department privately that the Book Fair was in decline, and was becoming a non-event.
The drafted speech which was never read concluded: “Irish authors have now at last entered into dialogue with their countrymen and women. The result is a great enrichment of Irish life and thought, a deepening of the authenticity of our literature, an enhanced self-knowledge. We must all do our best to foster and encourage the continuance of these things…”
But not, it seems, in the Irish language: Sáirséal agus Dill, under that name, came to an end in 1981, its efforts on behalf of the language movement well acknowledged, but failing in the end.
In the autumn of 1982 VAT on books was zero rated. The day before the extinction of the tax, Hanna’s Bookshop (I am reliably informed) did £57 worth of business. The day after it did £2000.
In June 1983 significantly Eason’s in their main store moved the magazine display so as to make room for a vastly increased display of books. The Irish boom in books that this indicated continues. In the English language that is. In Irish, the noble Gaelic language that was government policy to support, the tale is very different.
Contrasting memorials to Mayo’s heroes
Enda Kenny is currently under some criticism for his failure to bring enough development to his native Mayo. But efforts to extoll Mayo over the years have taken different forms. The new files reveal background detail on two contrasting memorials to two well-known heroes of Mayo, Captain John MacBride and Ernie O’Malley, late Commandant of the Old IRA.
On March 15, 1982 the government meeting in cabinet decided not to proceed with the erection in Castlebar of a museum of art in memory of Ernie O’Malley. Famous for his activities as a legendary IRA leader in both the War of Independence and the Civil War, and as the author of the classic account of the Irish revolution On Another Man’s Wound.
Art collection
O’Malley, whose later life was one of frustrated schemes, died in 1957. Then in 1978 his former wife, Mrs Helen Hooker O’Malley Roelofs, wrote to the then Minister of Education offering an extensive art collection, which she proposed to give to Ireland to be housed in a museum in O’Malley’s native Castlebar, “to be constructed and maintained with public funds”.
The government eventually agreed the scheme should be explored. It was first prosed the make the museum part of the new vocational school in Castlebar or perhaps in a former bank building. The bank fell through and Mrs Roelofs rejected the school. A new site was sought.
In 1981 the scheme was re-examined and costs and plans prepared for a museum by a firm of architects. The legal idea was that Mrs Roelofs would present the artworks to the American based Irish-American Cultural Institute and they in turn would give them to the Mayo Vocational Educational Committee. On her death they would become the property of the VEC.
Public purse
There were various conditions, not too onerous, attached to the gift. But the main factor was that it would be financed out of the public purse in Ireland.
To this end a valuation of the collection was made by an American art expert. There were not only paintings and other works of art, but also examples of ethnic crafts from various parts of the world. The valuation seems to have been a disappointment though none of the items are actually listed in the papers on file. It was valued at $412,000 or £310,009. Over 70% of the collection was valued at between $10 and $300.
The contrast between the inherent value of the collection (which some must have thought would have included Jack Yeats’ paintings) was in such a contrast to the cost of building the museum and running that the government agreed to look the gift horse in the mouth. The offer was turned down, and Ernie O’Malley went without commemoration.
Executed
In contrast, the memorial to Major John MacBride was unveiled in Westport on May 3, 1983. This scheme went back to 1944 when a local group began collecting subscriptions for a memorial to the local patriot who had supported the Boers and been executed in 1916. There was talk then of the memorial taking the form of a swimming pool and park.
However, though money was collected nothing came of the scheme. A smaller plaque was actually unveiled by de Valera but the old scheme had not died. It was revived by more local people and brought to a happy conclusion with the erection of a bust by Peter Grant on a plinth along the river bank in the town. This was unveiled with full ceremonies by President Hillary on July 3, 1983.
Admirers
The contrast in outcome is striking. While MacBride has his admirers – his son Seán was present at the unveiling – his treatment of his wife and other aspects of his life left a poor impression. This was only partly retrieved by his 1916 sacrifice.
Ernie O’Malley, an equally controversial figure in many ways, equally unlucky in his private life, was nevertheless a remarkable man, more remarkable than MacBride. But MacBride was safe, O’Malley was not. In such circumstances it is easy for a government minister to decide to say no.
The Government and the media: an old, old story retold
It is an essential feature of a healthy democracy that the free press will always be on the look out to expose government misdemeanours, and in some cases outright crimes.
In 1983, in the first days of January, the great scandal was the exposure of the official phone tapping of two journalists Bruce Arnold and Geraldine Kennedy, two figures still much to the fore among the commentariat of the nation.
Controversies
But all the controversies of the year reveal the initiatives of the government in dealing with the press. A specific file now released addresses itself to this very matter in the context of the year in question.
Observation
In June a paper was prepared for the Minister of Public Service on Government Public Relations. This began with a doleful, but familiar observation:
“The Government is perceived to be insensitive to the position of the individual man in the street. We are accused of being obsessed with eliminating the budget deficit. There is enormous pessimism and cynicism about governments generally and a lack of confidence, a sense of hopelessness. Consistent statements designed to emphasise the parlous state of the Exchequer finances have contributed to this, as has the recent period of political instability. The abortion referendum has not helped, the necessarily severe impact of the budget on people’s spending power. The volume of protests and campaigns leading to an unpleasant and accusatory mood ñ town v country; public v private; religion v religion; unions v self-employed.”
Reading this document from 30 years ago one might wonder if one was in some sort of time warp!
The outcome was to establish a committee charged with responsibility for coordinating communications policy. Yet more PR, more massaging of the news, more emphasis on good news in fact the remedies seem all too familiar. More policy advisers, more press officers, was the answer.
Uncanny
If the problems of 1983 seem to echo in an uncanny way the problems which seem to face us today, one has to pause, think, and ask: What has Ireland learned about good government in the last 30 years?
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