What have you ever done for a living?
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With a cabinet reshuffle in prospect and the need as advocated by Veronica that what is needed are people who are “competent in the business of job creation and enterprise generation and the stimulation of economic activity.” I reckoned I should sit down and do an update of a post from almost 3 years ago. But then I remembered that I had done this already when Batt O’Keeffe was saying that we needed more business people in the Dáil. So here it is in all its non-glory, the work history of the cabinet.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen – A local small town solicitor.
Mary Harney – was very briefly a secondary school teacher between her graduation in 1976 and her appointment to the Seanad by Jack Lynch in 1977.
Mary Coughlan - Very briefly worked as a social worker after college before taking her seat in a bye election.
Brian Lenihan – a barrister who was a lecturer in TCD and practised as a barrister before becoming a TD.
Brendan Smith – Oddly enough it appears he is the most professionally immersed in politics even while outside of elected politics as for a decade and a half he worked as special advisor to the Fianna Fáil TD and former Tánaiste John Wilson before becoming a TD.
John Gormley – Prior to entering full-time politics he ran an academy of European languages. So he was certainly in business though it was more the services end of things rather than what I’d term ‘making stuff’. Still it is a positive tick in his column.
Eamon Ryan – As far as I know he has run a couple of businesses involving the holiday trade and cycling. Another positive tick.
Bartholomew “Batt” O’Keeffe - Batt was a lecturer in CIT so I reckon that doesn’t count as a business background. Not sure what he lectured in but since it was a BA he got in UCC, I’m inclined to doubt that it was anything too technical or perhaps even all that practical either.
Dermot Ahern - A local solicitor
Noel Dempsey – A career guidance teacher
Mary Hanafin – A secondary school teacher
Micheál Martin – A secondary school teacher.
Martin Cullen – worked as a sales manager for a wine company. Seriously a wine company! He had at a point prior to that spent time in Zimbabwe or Rhodesia as it was then called seeking his fortune.
Willie O’Dea – O’Dea worked as a barrister and an accountant, and lectured at University College Dublin and the University of Limerick well it was still NIHE Limerick at the time he was there.
Éamon Ó Cuív – was manager of Gaeltacht Co-operative, a company involved in agricultural services including timber milling, tourism and cultural development. Apparently, this was very much a hands off role.
Feel free to draw your own conclusions about their ability to do much about the business of job creation and enterprise generation and the stimulation of economic activity.
Dan,
The majority of our TDs – and Senators too – come from either teaching or legal backgrounds of one sort or another, even if they have paper qualifications that might have entitled them to engage in private sector business in a former career. There’s a couple of ex-journalists (though one less since George Lee fired himself), a few farmers or farmers cum auctioneers cum undertakers, a few people with trade unionist backgrounds (notably Gilmore and Rabbitte) and so far as I know, only one TD whose background is PhD level science.
Go through the front benches of FG or Labour and I think you will find persons of broadly similar background to the present Cabinet. The unfortunate truth thous appears to be that the longer any of them become cocooned within the bubble of Irish political life the more divorced they become from its realities irrespective of professional qualifications or previous work/career experience.
So when I argued that what was needed at Cabinet level were people “competent in the business of job creation and enterprise generation and the stimulation of economic activity,” I most certainly wasn’t thinking of the professional qualifications of those who might be selected to serve in such office, because the ‘right qualifications’ are pretty thin on the ground in either Dail or Seanad Eireann. Putting it politely, what I was getting at was more having the intellectual capacity to take over a brief, master it and run with it and make decisions on the basis of what is in the best interests of all citizens and society. About dispensing with ideological presumptions or political partisanship or the risk of becoming captive to favoured coteries of vested interest groups. About having the courage to face down vested interests or the ‘mob culture brigade’ of radio show phone-ins. Crucially, about having the political and personality skills to persuade majority public opinion that you will try to do your best for them, first and foremost, and then just getting on with it.
I think the same principles apply to resolving problems in areas like defence, environment, foreign affairs, social policy, arts and culture as in matters of finance or fostering enterprise and job creation. There’s no shortage of expert advice available to politicians if they want it and are willing to take account of it to make up for their own lack of technical prowess in any area. What’s at issue is their own good judgement, character and intellectual capacity to deal with what’s sitting in front of them; and their personal courage as well.
Why the positive marks for the Green ministers? Hardly successful businessmen in fairness, a languages and cycling gig….nice post tho, it’s more of less the same across the Dail. But why would a successful businessman or woman go into politics if they are on top form in the private sector? Perhaps only because they’ve lost their job…
Also, what’s the story with all the teachers? Is it because they can claim teachers’ pensions etc while taking a Dail salary?
How are they not successful businessmen? Ryan’s business is still going and seems to be quite ’successful’ http://www.cyclingsafaris.com/
As for the ‘not making stuff’ – so long as they bring money into the economy then that is good enough, whether the result is a physical product is neither here nor there.
I know it’s a bit more work Dan but it may be worth updating for a few of the likely lads among the juniors since we may see a few of them at Cabinet especially if the rumours about Cullen quitting are true.
and most of the rest of the tds business history via thestory crowdsource http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AjmjK2zwIIBvdHVoTlc3SHVQa0s2eGJFZ1JaXzlubkE&hl=en_GB
so people interested in public service and then in further ‘public service’ should be put off?
I will try and get around to some of the likely juniors that might be making the step up. Veronica, I’ve said it before that the problem is not specific to FF but to the Oireachtas and Irish politics generally, that said I’m not as inclined to do the leg work for others as regards the other parties. Folks are free to do the same for FG/Lab/SF and post here.
As for the point about ‘making stuff’, I think there is a different mindset that comes from dealing with the practicalities of making something real that is missing from Irish politics. I’m not arguing that they should all be engineers or whatever simply that more should be, and the qualities required to assess expertise advice in some areas does involve some of those qualities we would find in the more hard science based disciplines i order as you say to master a brief.
The reason there are so many teachers and lawyers in the Dail is due to the time demands of trying to become a politician- solicitors or barristers often have very flexible work schedules, while teachers get a long vacation plus early afternoons plus due to the nature of their job often get to know a lot of people in their area.
Its more likely that people who have an interest in public affairs/politics often gravitate towards these kind of jobs due to the fact that it allows them to engage in politics.
I don’t necessarily think there is anything wrong with that, the reality is that it often takes years to get elected in Ireland so you need some kind of job security/time freedom to pursue that activity. Being a solicitor or teacher also means you develop good communication skills and are often good at understanding and analyzing different briefs.
Its also wrong to presume that a business person would make a good TD/minister. Yes they may have had a succesful career but most business people in Ireland are successful due to either A) family inheritance providing the necessary capital or contacts for new ventures or B) knowing the right people for government contracts or niches in markets. While this is a broad generalisation, its not too far from the truth.
There is no correct profession, though some areas are significantly underrepresented in irish politics like engineering and science.
After witnessing the behaviour of many of what were our most successful business men and entrepreneurs in recent years Im glad they wern’t TDs becuase the recession could have been a whole lot worse
Dan,
Thanks to the stats section of the ever-useful Nealon’s Guide, the pre-political occupation of deputies as elected to the 30th Dail in June 2007 is as follows:
Teachers………38
Business………22
Lawyers……….16
Clerical & Tech..15
Farmers……….14
Accountants……10
Auctioneers…….6
Publicans………6
Science & Eng. …5
Doctors………..5
Nurses…………3
Public Servants…4
Architects……..3
Journalists…….2
Trade Unionists…2
Butcher………..1
Army…………..1
Veronica, I’m sure a healthy portion of those teachers and lawyers are represented in FG and Lab. I do wonder at the low number of publicans but it is possible that some such as John Moloney TD who has a number of business interests including publican and undertaker might have designated themselves under the more general business title rather than publican.
Again as Cathal notes “There is no correct profession, though some areas are significantly underrepresented in irish politics like engineering and science.” my point being that we see the Oireachtas make mistakes all too often because it lacks a broad enough representative base to know when it is being conned. Simon has referred to this before when gender quotas are proposed, the problem for me isn’t the lack of women in politics but the lack of people. More teachers and lawyers simply because they are women won’t properly leaven this bread. And the reason many women don’t get involved are largely the same as the reasons engineers and folks with a 8-5 grind and a commute don’t, they don’t have the time to do the things that get you elected but which don’t make you a useful member of parliament, and they don’t see the point in applying for a job that you end up not being able to do because of the things you have to do to get it. The skills to get the job; aren’t the skills to do the job.
Dan,
I don’t want to be flippant, but I think a lot of women can’t be bothered with mainstream politics because they have better things to do with their time.
That said, personality type is arguably much more important than gender in making the choice to enter public life. I’m not aware of any studies that show that women behave substantially differently to men when it comes to exercising power, which makes a nonsense of all this ‘gender quota’ insanity.
The number of women elected to the Dail has remained around the 20 mark in the past four elections since 1992 (22 in the 2002 and 2007 elections) but at least a dozen or more of these female Teachtai fall into the ‘family business’ category in that they either have a close relationship to someone who blazed the political trail before them (husband, father or brother) or come from what might be termed political families. All part of the ’skills to get the job’ I reckon, which as you point out isn’t the same thing as having “the skills to do the job”.
But I think you’re way too charitable in suggesting that “we see the Oireachtas make mistakes all too often because it lacks a broad enough representative base to know when it is being conned”. I’m afraid I’d attach considerably more weight to the posession of some altogether less flattering attributes exhibited by our political class that account for the bad decisions.
Veronica, as always, cuts through the flimflam and exposes the soft underbelly that is Irish politcs.
The reality is that Dail Eireann & Seanad Eireann are grossly over-manned.
One TD per 100,000 of adult population is more than sufficient for this small, open, island economy.
There will never be efficiency as long as there is overlap in the allocation of responsibilities to the various Ministries.
The constant re-shuffles and awards of Junior Ministries militate against any possibility of an orderly Administration.
Six Ministries (Including a Taoiseach – as Foreign Affairs Minister ) would make an ideal management Team.
After all; what is there that requires these legions of ministers?
- Beyond Justice (including Defense); Finance; Communications; Natural Resources and Human Resources?
All other administrative functions could be managed by suitably competent professional civil servants.
Think Small: Simple: Efficient.
sos, one TD per 100,000 adults would work out at about 27/29 TDs. from that you’d have to about half it to get the poll for the government and opposition so say 16 government TDS and 13 opposition and from that 16 you would be selecting your ministers. You have to allow for some reasonable degree of turnover at each election given the average lifespan of someone being a TD So you’re looking at probably 5/6 newbies each election and perhaps up to 10, you can’t have them be ministers on day 1 so out of the 16 government TDs only 12 would be eligible to be ministers. So in effect almost all would be ministers, and who exactly is going to scrutinise legalisation?
As for 6 ministries? I agree that we’ve way too many juniors (and why are they so often addressed by the media as “minister”?, they aren’t so they shouldn’t be) but 6 ministries is lunacy. What is the minister for Natural Resources going to prioritise in a conflict between food and energy?
The public don’t elect people who are good managers, why do you think they would do so if the numbers were smaller?
I most certainly wasn’t thinking of the professional qualifications of those who might be selected to serve in such office, because the ‘right qualifications’ are pretty thin on the ground in either Dail or Seanad Eireann.
The “right qualifications”, you say?
I think that they’re election by the voters, nothing more, nothing less. Anything else is (to put it mildly) undemocratic and reeks of middle-class elitism.
Dan,
I was really majoring on the issue of too many Cabinet Ministers, not overall Dail representation.
At the moment, as far as I can gather, the latter is controlled by a section of the Constitution.
Notwithstanding that, a reduction in real terms is needed; maybe to, say, two per county = 52.
With a maximum of Six Cabinet Ministers, who would vacate all constituency affairs while in the Cabinet, duplication &overlap might be eliminated, leading to better & more efficient decision-taking.
In answer to your comment about food & energy. Both are products of Natural Resources, thus, as they are both answerable to the same Minister, any conflict can be sorted out at a much lower level.
The component parts, which are presently controlled by a plethora of ministers, would, in future, be managed by professionals from the Civil Service, with suitable qualifications.
The balance of elected TDs would remain in their constituencies and manage in the manner of local councillors.