This story was first published in the Irish Mail on Sunday on 06/11/2011
By: Michael O’Farrell
Investigations Editor
THE Government could fill a fifth of all judges’ positions with party supporters before the next election – despite Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s vow to make judicial appointments less political.
Including three appointments made this week, 30 new judges are due to be appointed in the next four years.
In their eight months in office, all five people chosen by the Fine Gael-Labour coalition to be appointed or promoted to top judicial posts have been close political allies.
The Government appointed its first two High Court judges – Michael White and Kevin Cross – early last month. And this week the Cabinet nominated three new District Court judges: Michael Coghlan, Patrick Durcan and Gráinne Malone.
Michael Coghlan was an election agent for Labour MEP Nessa Childers in the 2009 European elections, while Gráinne Malone is a sister of Labour councillor Emer Costello, who is married to Labour TD Joe Costello, and a sister of Labour senator Mary Moran.
Patrick Durcan, a four-time election running mate of Enda Kenny, is a Fine Gael party trustee, a key party strategist, a former party election agent, a former member of Mayo County Council and a former Fine Gael senator.
The two new High Court appointees also have close party connections.
Judge White is a former Workers’ Party colleague of Labour leader Eamon Gilmore and represented him as a solicitor. And Judge Cross made a political donation of €1,200 to European Affairs Minister Lucinda Creighton prior to February’s general election.
The appointees are all highly qualified for their new judicial roles but their political connections have left the Government open to criticism.
Newspaper revelations of these political leanings prompted an attack by Justice Minister Alan Shatter two weeks ago.
‘It seems that the decency, competence and integrity of individuals appointed to undertake onerous duties for the benefit of the State and its citizens, and the integrity of those who make such appointments, is to be consistently targeted and undermined by some sections of the media.
‘Any suggestion that either appointment is based on anything other than merit or has any base or hidden motive is completely untrue,’ he added.
Yet, when he was in opposition, Mr Shatter persistently criticised Fianna Fáil’s appointment of politicallyconnected judges. In 2000, he called for judicial nominees to be cross-examined by the Oireachtas justice committee.
He also confronted then justice minister John O’Donoghue about a delay in appointing a judge, asking if the delay was because the government ‘could not identify a card-carrying member of the Fianna Fáil party?’ In response, O’Donoghue admitted he had received 40 representations in just over two years. Following a recent landmark ruling, details of the previous government’s lobbying were revealed under the Freedom of Information Act. However, details of what, if any, lobbying has taken place in the current administration is not known.
Mr Shatter has promised to review the process for appointing judges and he has appointed three independent lay figures to the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board, which assesses applications from would-be judges.
…same story when it comes to State boards
LIKE judicial appointments, positions on State boards have traditionally been seen as a political gift to be shared among loyal supporters.
And despite promises to eliminate such cronyism, Fine Gael and the Labour Party have, in recent months, made a number of controversial appointments.
In June, Justice Minister Alan Shatter appointed barrister Oliver Connolly to a €12,500 part-time position in the Garda Síochána.
Mr Connolly had previously donated €1,000 to Mr Shatter.
Also this year, Food Minister Simon Coveney appointed one-time Fine Gael election candidate Brody Sweeney as a board member of Bord Bia.
Mr Coveney also appointed Labour supporter Gary Brown to the board. Mr Brown made a donation of €640 to Ruairi Quinn’s election campaign in 2007.
These appointments come despite a commitment from Enda Kenny to eliminate appointments that could be perceived as being politically motivated.
As part of this commitment, Government departments are now advertising on their websites for applicants who believe they are suitably qualified to work on a State board.
However, as demonstrated by one such advert posted on the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources website, the initiative does not guarantee that ministers will not be politically motivated: ‘The applicant accepts that appointments are made in the exercise of a statutory discretion, that the minister is not obliged to consider the expressions of interest offered, that he is not confined to making an appointment from amongst those who have expressed an interest…’ Former Fine Gael TD and chairman of the Public Accounts Committee Bernard Allen was appointed to the board of the Irish Sports Council last weekend following one such advertisement for applicants.
Mr Allen – who is working for free – was appointed by Sport Minister Leo Varadkar. Mr Varadkar rejected suggestions that the appointment was political, saying Mr Allen was ‘by far the best person for the job’.
ENDS
NewsScoops is always happy when others follow in our footsteps. Here’s how the Irish Times covered the story on November 14 – two weeks after we published our version.
Five out of six judges appointed have connections to Fine Gael or Labour
PAUL CULLEN, Political Staff
JUDICIARY: THE GOVERNMENT has nominated six judges to date – and five have a personal, family or funding link to Fine Gael or Labour.
Last month, the Government nominated Judge Michael White, a former Workers’ Party election candidate, to the High Court. Judge White was promoted from the Circuit Court, to which he was appointed by the last Coalition government in 1996.
In the Workers’ Party, part of which morphed into Democratic Left and later merged with Labour, Judge White was a colleague of Labour leader Eamon Gilmore.
The other appointee, Kevin Cross, a son-in-law of former Fine Gael minister Patrick Lindsay, made a political donation of €1,200 to Minister of State for European Affairs Lucinda Creighton before February’s general election. High Court judges earn €243,000 a year but this will fall shortly to €187,000 on foot of the “Yes” vote in the referendum on judicial pay.
Minister for Justice Alan Shatter professed himself appalled at the way the party connections of the two appointees were highlighted in the media, rightly pointing out that there was nothing to suggest the appointments were made on any criterion other than merit. Both men are regarded as being exceptionally well-qualified for the positions to which they have been appointed.
Mr Shatter had already vented his fury last June when it emerged that the Government’s appointee as a liaison for whistleblowers in An Garda Síochána, barrister Oliver Connolly, had donated €1,000 to his election campaign in 2007. Mr Connolly is the founder of Friary Law, which has developed a family mediation model together with Mr Shatter, a solicitor and expert in family law.
Mr Shatter said Mr Connolly’s donation had “no connection” with the Cabinet’s appointment. “Nobody has ever suggested that an individual who contributes to democratic politics in this country should be discriminated against, pilloried and excluded from ever being appointed to any body whatsoever.” The part-time post of “confidential recipient” for complaints from gardaí about corruption in the force pays €12,500 a year.
Last week, the Government appointed a further three judges to the Bench, this time in the District Court. Solicitor Michael Coghlan was an election agent for Labour MEP Nessa Childers in the 2009 European elections. Patrick Durcan was Fine Gael Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald’s nominee in the Seanad in the 1980s and a former running-mate of Taoiseach Enda Kenny. Gráinne Malone is a sister of Labour councillor Emer Malone (wife of Labour TD Joe Costello) and sister of Mary Moran, who was nominated to the Seanad this year by Labour leader Eamon Gilmore.
District Court judges earn €148,000 a year but this will fall shortly to €124,000.
Applications for judicial vacancies are assessed by the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board, which presents government with a shortlist of suitable candidates. The actual appointments are made by the president. The idea is to take sole discretion for appointments away from government.
The board does not interview applicants or seek out suitable candidates; it has the power to do so but cites “practical difficulties” preventing this. Effectively, therefore, it screens for suitability and competence but does not rate candidates according to merit. As a result, the seven-name “shortlist” it passes to government gives politicians plenty of freedom to plump for party supporters if they wish to.
Indeed, the government is free to ignore the names on the shortlist and offer a post to someone else, provided it advertises this fact in the official State publication, Iris Oifigiúil.
In May, the Taoiseach pledged he would not use “political bias” in the appointment of personnel to the advisory board. The following month, Mr Shatter appointed three new lay members of the 10- person body, including Karen Dent, an accountant who is a long-time Fine Gael activist in Mr Shatter’s constituency, and Dr Valerie Bresnihan, an independent NUI Seanad candidate in 2002 and 2007 who was a member of the Labour party in the 1990s.
All the evidence is that political party affiliation does not play a decisive part in decision-making once judges are appointed, and it’s worth pointing out that the calibre of Irish judges is generally very high. However, Mr Shatter has ordered a review of the system of judicial appointments.
Pre-election pledges on ending political cronyism ring hollow
Paul Cullen
ANALYSIS : The Coalition has reneged on promises to end feather-bedding and patronage
THE APPOINTMENT of political cronies to State boards is as old as our democracy. Complaints by opposition parties about the practice they themselves indulged in while in government are almost as old.
The current Government will be judged on the scale of its considerable promises in this area.
Fine Gael and Labour politicians have repeatedly promised a comprehensive reform of the political system and, specifically, the elimination of political patronage.
The reality is that the Government has not, or not yet, lived up to its ambitions. As this review of appointments shows, the selection of large numbers of people with political links to the Government continues.
Although there is no reason to believe any of the appointees are not up to the job, there remains little or no transparency in the process for selecting board members of State bodies.
In its manifesto, Labour promised to end the system whereby appointments to State boards were used as a form of political patronage and for rewarding insiders. In future, all appointments would be based on a “demonstrable capacity to do the job”.
The party promised to publicly advertise all vacancies, not just the chairmen, and to ensure that Oireachtas committees considered the suitability of nominated candidates.
Fine Gael, in its manifesto, promised to tackle “cronyism and feather-bedding” in politics. As well as scrapping some agencies, the party said paid directorships would be advertised.
These commitments failed to appear in the Coalition’s programme for government. The only commitment in that document is an assurance that at least 40 per cent of each gender will be represented on State boards.
Shortly after coming to power, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said he wanted to put an end to political cronyism. But what he had in mind in his Dáil speech was the rash of more than 100 appointments, some politically influenced, made by the outgoing government between the election and its last day in office.
On legal advice, the Coalition had to abandon a pledge to sack those appointed by their Fianna Fáil/Green predecessors.
In April, the Cabinet resolved that vacancies on public boards should be advertised online and that chairmen would have to appear before a relevant Oireachtas committee before their appointment was ratified.
Crucially, the committee has no power of veto and the final decision still rests with the Minister.
Minister for Transport Leo Varadkar was quick to implement the new rules, with public advertisements for the posts of chairman of CIÉ and its subsidiary companies. And most of the chairmen he appointed have appeared before committees.
At least seven other departments have yet to start advertising for posts, let alone ensuring that chairmen appear before the committees.
Five departments have begun implementing the rules; in a number of others, some posts have been filled by the new process while others have not.
The Government has also imposed a “one person, one salary” rule on the public service by decreeing that from the start of this month public servants sitting on State boards should not be paid fees.
Tasc, in a report published last July, criticised the “ad hoc and politicised manner” in which people are appointed to boards and called for reforms to address a lack of accountability and oversight.
The think tank estimated there are more than 600 public bodies, to which several thousand board members are appointed on a regular basis.
Between 1997 and 2006, for example, nearly 7,000 appointments were made.
Ministers and senior civil servants are responsible for appointing most of those serving on public boards: “In many cases, appointments are entirely at the ministers’ discretion, requiring neither justification nor any evidence that appointments have been made on the basis of . . . qualifications.”
Few modern politicians would concur – at least not in public – with Fianna Fáil minister Donogh O’Malley’s admission in the 1960s that, faced with a choice between two people of equal merit, he would always choose the Fianna Fáil person. However, they generally defend their right to appoint people to State boards.
Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore, for example, argued last year that government should appoint the boards as one of its executive functions. The making of appointments on a “tribal” basis would be avoided “by exercising discipline, by exercising good judgment”, he said, and people would be appointed “on merit”.
Mr Gilmore was expressing his opposition to the creation of an independent body to carry out this task, an idea favoured by Tasc, the Institute of Directors and many business groups. Tasc argues that the existing system of appointment-by-minister gives elite groups a near-monopoly over public board positions, and thus inordinate and unaccountable influence over public policy.
“Essentially, the governing party – regardless of ideological hue – is allowed to shape public boards in its own [political] image,” its report argues.
And since board terms do not coincide with Dáil elections, the governing party is able to exercise influence beyond its term of office.
Government picks backers for posts despite promise
PAUL CULLEN, Political Staff
THE GOVERNMENT has been sharply criticised by Fianna Fáil for failing to deliver on pre-election promises by Fine Gael and Labour to reform the way in which people are appointed to State boards.
A review of Government appointments shows that at least 20 past or present party members, strategists or donors have been appointed to such posts since the Coalition came into office in March.
Half of all departments have yet to recruit board members through public advertisement, as promised by the Government, while only five departments have so far fully implemented the commitment to seek expressions of interest online.
In only two cases has a person appointed as chairman appeared before an Oireachtas committee, another Government pledge. But some hearings are pending and some departments have yet to appoint any chairmen.
Fianna Fáil TD Michael McGrath said it was clear the Government had not followed through on its commitments to introduce a transparent system of political appointments.
“Nothing has changed. The promised transformation hasn’t materialised,” said Mr McGrath, adding that as long as appointments were in the gift of politicians, “cronyism will remain”.
Minister for Transport Leo Varadkar has made three appointments to the Road Safety Authority, where board members are paid €8,100 a year. Among his appointees are Ronan Melvin, who lives in the Minister’s constituency and nominated Fine Gael candidate Kieran Dennison in the 2009 local elections. Another choice is Seán Finan, a Macra na Feirme member from Castlerea, Co Roscommon and a regional organiser for Young Fine Gael.
Last month, Mr Varadkar appointed former Fine Gael minister Bernard Allen to the board of the Irish Sports Council. Mr Allen, who retired last February, was the country’s first sports minister in the 1990s and also chaired the Public Accounts Committee. He is not taking any fee for the post.
Last week, the Government appointed four new directors to Pobal, including Labour county councillor (and former Progressive Democrat TD) Mae Sexton and Siobhán McLoughlin, a former Labour election candidate from Co Donegal.
However, Ms Sexton said yesterday she was not in a position to take up the post.
In April, Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney announced the appointment of Phil Meaney as chairman of Bord na gCon.
Mr Coveney said his choice was “eminently well-qualified” for the appointment, with a business background and a 25-year involvement in the greyhound industry.
Mr Meaney is chairman of Fine Gael’s electoral strategy group in Carlow-Kilkenny and played a major part in the party’s success in winning three seats in the constituency last February. As chairman, Mr Meaney is paid €21,600 a year plus expenses.
Mr Coveney has also appointed two people with party links to the board of Bord Bia. One is Brody Sweeney, the founder of O’Brien’s Sandwich bars which went into liquidation in 2009, who got 3,400 votes as a Fine Gael candidate in Dublin in the 2007 general election.
Another of Mr Coveney’s appointees is Gary Brown, chief executive of Below the Line Marketing, who donated €640 to Labour TD Ruairí Quinn in 2007.
Among those Minister for Justice Alan Shatter has appointed to the Parole Board is Ciairin de Buis, who has sat on a number of Labour Party committees. Ordinary members of the board are paid €7,695 a year plus a per diem payment for each prison visit up to a limit of €12,600, plus travel and other allowances at Civil Service rates.
There’s no remuneration for sitting on the board of the National Concert Hall but the list of names appointed by Minister for Arts Jimmy Deenihan includes Gina Menzies, a theologian and former Fine Gael county councillor; and Pat Heneghan, a public relations consultant and former party strategist.
Minister for Communications and Energy Pat Rabbitte has appointed former Labour treasurer James Wrynn to the board of An Post and Bride Rosney to the board of Eirgrid. Ms Rosney was adviser to president Mary Robinson, the party’s 1candidate for the presidency in 1990.
Some 14 of the special advisers appointed to Government ministers are also being paid above approved guidelines which state they should be paid on the first point of the principal office scale in the Civil Service, just over €80,000. Four of the advisers are earning over €100,000, according to figures provided by Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin.
