The most controversial of them all

Obituary: The death of former taoiseach Charles J Haughey (80) brings down the curtain on one of the most colourful and controversial political careers in the history of the State.

Mr Haughey, Fianna Fáil leader from 1979 until 1992, served three terms as taoiseach - 1979 to 1981, March 1982 to December 1982 and 1987 to 1992 - and also held several ministerial roles including the justice, agriculture and finance portfolios.

He was born in Castlebar, Co Mayo on September 16th 1925. Shortly after his birth, his father, an officer first in the IRA, then in the Irish Army, was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis after which the family moved to Dublin

Mr Haughey was educated at St Joseph’s CBS in Fairview. Academically gifted, he won a scholarship to University College Dublin, where he studied accountancy. He also studied law at King’s Inns and qualified as a barrister before establishing the accountancy firm Haughey Boland & Co in Dublin in 1951 with his friend Harry Boland.

In the same year he married Máirín Lemass, daughter of the future taoiseach Sean Lemass.

He was first elected to the Dáil in 1957 having served as a councillor in Dublin, and was re-elected at each election until 1992.

In the 1960s, Mr Haughey began accumulating assets including a farm in Meath, the island of Innishvickillaun off Co Kerry, and the 18th century house and lands at Abbeville at Kinsealy in north county Dublin.

His wealth and standard of living, even then well beyond his apparent means on a political salary, became a source of great interest for sections of the media. However, Mr Haughey refused to entertain questions about his wealth and always insisted his financial affairs were out of bounds for journalists.

Despite a glittering early ministerial career throughout the 1960s during which Haughey was seen to represent a new breed of modern Fianna Fail politician, his political life came to a dramatic and thundering standstill in 1970. Mr Haughey, along with Neil Blaney, was sacked from Jack Lynch’s government that year after they were accused of using a fund established to aid the nationalist community in Northern Ireland to import guns for the IRA

Cleared by the subsequent Arms trial, Haughey was cast into the political wilderness. While Blaney left Fianna Fail in the wake of that crisis, Haughey bided his time on the back benches and relentlessly toured Fianna Fail cummans throughout the country rebuilding his support at the grassroots level.

In 1975 with Fianna Fáil in opposition, Haughey’s time on the "chicken-dinner circuit" had paid off and he had achieved enough political clout to be recalled to Jack Lynch’s front bench. He was appointed Spokesman on Health & Social Welfare. Fianna Fail won a landslide victory in the 1997 general election and in 1979 Mr Haughey succeeded Jack Lynch as leader after a bitter battle against his former classmate and long-time political rival George Colley.

Mr Haughey’s famous exhortation to the electorate as Ireland spiralled into a prolonged economic crisis in 1980 that we were living "way beyond our means" later came back to haunt him as tales of his own high living gradually emerged from the tribunals, including the McCracken tribunal and the Moriarty tribunal.

The Moriarty tribunal recently heard estimates from the Revenue Commissioners of Mr Haughey’s spending from 1977 to 1997 ranged from a maximum of £9.9 million to a minimum of £6 million.

In negotiations, the Revenue and Mr Haughey’s agents arrived a figure of £6.9 million, which they agreed could be viewed as representative of the total gifts he had received in that period.

Some £1.3 million was paid to Haughey by Ben Dunne alone and the politician racked up massive bills at expensive restaurants and buying designer clothes, including thousands spent on shirts custom made for him in Paris.

His 1980 speech contained perhaps the most often-repeated Haughey quote urging a collective tightening of economic belts and a reorganisation in government spending "so that we can only undertake those things we can afford".

The word GUBU - coined by journalist Conor Cruise O’Brien in 1982 - was to become permanently attached to Haughey’s political legacy. Its origins lay in Haughey’s reaction to the disclosure that on-the-run murderer Malcolm MacArthur had been found at the apartment of then attorney general Patrick Connolly. Upon hearing the news, Haughey famously described the unfolding events as grotesque, unbelievable, bizarre and unprecedented, which almost immediately led to the acronym that became shorthand for the many controversies of his administrations.

It was not revelations about his finances and tax settlements (which continued to emerge even in recent weeks,) but the scandal surrounding the tapping of phones belonging to a number of journalists’ (including the current editor of The Irish Times, Geraldine Kennedy) that finally brought Mr Haughey down a decade after it first emerged.

In 1992, Former Fianna Fáil TD and justice minister Sean Doherty appeared on the late-night chat show Nighthawks on RTE television. In an apparently off-the-cuff interview Doherty discussed the phone-tapping at length with presenter Shay Healy. At a subsequent press conference, Doherty contradicted a decade’s denials and admitted that Mr Haughey, while Taoiseach in 1982, had known about the phone tapping. Doherty also confirmed that he had personally given Haughey transcripts of the tapes.

On his final day in the Dail as Taoiseach on February 11th 1992, Mr Haughey quoted from Othello: "I have done the State some service; They know’t. No more of that."

Mr Haughey was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1995.

In recent years, the Moriarty tribunal agreed that the former taoiseach should no longer be required to give evidence due to illness.

Earlier this month, it emerged at the tribunal that the Revenue has accepted a payment from him of £3.94 million (€5m) in 2003 in settlement of an estimated tax bill of £5.5 million ((€6.98 million). At the time, it was the largest ever made by a taxpayer.

It also emerged that Mr Haughey had told the Revenue he had not received any gifts of money since 1997 and that he was living on borrowings from a building society.

In 2003, Mr Haughey sold Abbeville to private developers for a reported €35 million. There are plans to build a number of exclusive homes on the lands.

While he was heavily criticised for his lavish lifestyle and his acceptance of massive payments from business people such as Ben Dunne, Mr Haughey was also credited with many innovative political ideas. He is most often noted for extending free travel on public transport to older people and for the creation of generous tax breaks for artists.

Mr Haughey consistently topped the poll in his Dublin North Central constituency, where he remained extremely popular, particularly with older voters, despite the continuing revelations about his lavish lifestyle. His son Sean has held the same seat since his father’s retirement in 1992.

Charles Haughey is survived by his wife Maureen, his daughter Eimear and sons Ciaran, Conor and Sean.

Charles J Haughey, born September 16th, 1925; died June 13th 2006