Dublin is preparing for the EU Heads of State meetings and what is described as the largest political and policing event in the history of the state. It must mark the pinnacle of Micheál Martin’s long career in politics. Whatever one may think of his tenure as Taoiseach, there is no doubting Martin has been part of a political establishment which has totally transformed the Irish Republic beyond recognition.
Who would have suspected that this largely unassuming Corkman with a fairly low political profile prior to his becoming leader of Fianna Fáil would have had such an impact. But, after such a long time, how well do we really know Micheál Martin and what are his core values?
Unlike many figures in Irish political life colourful anecdotes about Martin are few and far between. The only story I ever heard about his time as a student in U.C.C. was that he used to turn up to his first year Arts lectures in a suit, shirt and tie at a time when jeans and plaid shirts were the norm for students. It was said that sometimes other students mistook him for a lecturer because of his attire.
He qualified as a teacher but only spent a short period of time teaching, opting instead to dedicate his time to the role of full time politician after taking a seat in Cork Corporation in 1985.
This was an unusual step for someone from a working class background, to give up a salaried job in a cash strapped and heavily unemployed Cork of the 1980s. However, he was quietly plotting his course and was elected a TD in 1989.
Martin became a Minister in Education (1997), Health (2000) and Trade (2004). His most notable impact in these years was the introduction of the smoking ban which he still regards as his greatest achievement. There was little indication from these years that he would go on to become what can be best described as one of Ireland’s great political survivors.
In 2009, Brian Cowen became party leader as the sole nominee of the party. For Martin it must have seemed that as Cowen took office as leader and Taoiseach that he would never get a chance at the leadership. Cowen who is the same age as Martin was effectively the chosen one for that generation of FFers and would have been expected to hold the leadership for a dozen years or more like most of his predecessors. In addition, Cowen’s inner circle of Mary Coughlan as Deputy Leader and Brian Lenihan as Minister for Finance looked like a rock solid team into the future. Unlike Martin this group were also bound together in personal as well as professional friendship as all were the children of Fianna Fail TDs and inheritors of the party mantle and tradition.
Micheál Martin was effectively an outsider from this circle of friends and his new role as Minister of Foreign Affairs must have been seen by him as an out of domestic politics where it looked like he had no future.
However the reign of Brian Cowen came to an abrupt end with the economic crash in 2011 and in a scene reminiscent of the much quoted line from the Godfather movie Martin must have felt like the Michael Corleone character who says ” Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in”.
The death of Brian Lenihan, and Mary Coughlan losing her Dáil seat, meant the Cowen era had truly ended.
However while the hand of fate had been kind to Martin he was taking over a greatly reduced Fianna Fail which lost 57 seats in the 2011 election.
It was an inglorious start but the era of Micheál Martin against the odds had begun.
One of the key figures Martin brought in to rebuild the party was the London academic and political scientist Tim Bale. Bale was a key influencer who told the 2017 Árd Fheis that the party’s traditional pro life stance on abortion would put them on the ” wrong side of history”. It was noted that many ordinary FF members were not in agreement with this viewpoint but Martin certainly took Bale’s advice very seriously.
In 2018 in a political move which took many Fianna Fail TDs and Senators by surprise Martin announced his support to remove the Pro Life 8th Amendment and proceed with the legalisation of abortion. Despite this, 31 of his TDs and Senators continued to support the pro-life position. However, the dye was cast, and Martin had turned his back on the party’s traditional pro life core position. In the subsequent 2020 election, Fianna Fáil lost 6 seats which was viewed by some in the party as a grassroots rejection of Martin’s stance.
The traditional core value of Fianna Fail as a staunchly nationalist party was also remoulded by Martin. While the ideal of a united Ireland was a key objective of the party since its foundation by Devalera and reiterated by every subsequent leader, Martin seemed much more at home with a revision of this core value with the notion of a “shared Ireland” or “shared home place”. The nationalist core value, it would seem, was also expendable. Now the Fianna Fáil leader says he wants no part of a “backward-looking sovereignty”.
Martin’s effective u turn on the Triple Lock is also an interesting development. The pendulum has swung from Martin’s traditional defence of Irish neutrality and The Triple Lock in his early years in leadership to the opposite now and his desire to have it scrapped.
Undoubtedly the greatest change has been the inward migration during his tenure which has resulted in a population change from 4.5 million in 2010 to 5.5 million today of which 25% were born outside Ireland. This contrasts sharply with Northern Ireland which has a corresponding figure of 6%.
While Martin argues that we need workers and skills from abroad, the increase in population during his tenure in leadership has overseen an era of mayhem in terms of rocketing and unaffordable rent and a generation who probably will never be able to afford a home of their own.
This has resulted in at least 250,000 native born Irish emigrating in the last ten years.
However ,Martin has seemed at times to be more taken up with the EU’s preoccupation with Russia and the Ukrainian war than such domestic matters.
If Martin has earned one political friend it is probably EU President Ursula Von Der Leyen who has praised Martin for “excellent cooperation” over their years together.
While Micheal Martin most certainly will never attract the fierce devotion and divisive mistrust accorded his predecessors such as DeValera, Haughey or Ahern he has arguably transformed Fianna Fáil and the Irish Republic more than any or all of them together. But that has left his party languishing in the polls on low levels of political support that his predecessors might never have thought possible.