Jim Mitchell was one of the most unselfish politicians I have known.
Having contested a by-election in Dublin West in 1970 at the age of 23, he was the front-runner for Fine Gael in Dublin South West in the run-up to the 1973 General Election. But he persuaded Declan Costello to return to politics by taking what would have been his place as a Fine Gael candidate. His commitment to politics had been sparked off by Declan Costello's Just Society initiative five years earlier.
He was elected to the Dáil in 1977 when Declan Costello stood down again. He proved himself in the difficult role of Minister for Justice during the 1981 hunger strike and its aftermath, which included attempts by violent IRA rioters to reach and sack the British Embassy in Ballsbridge.
I recall that his commitment to national security led him on one occasion to persuade the garda protecting my house to open our front door at 1.30 one morning so that he could enter the bedroom where Joan and I were sleeping in order to apprise me of some serious development.
During our brief period in Opposition in 1982, it was he who discovered the abuse of phone tapping by Charles Haughey and Sean Doherty that was exposed immediately following the return to government of the Fine Gael/Labour Coalition in December of that year. As Minister for Communications between 1982 and 1987, he won the respect of many in the business world by his energetic re-vitalisation of a number of State enterprises.
The introduction of competition on air routes to Britain in 1986 was his personal initiative: it sparked off the low-cost revolution in air transport led by Ryanair as Europe's first low-cost airline, for which millions of Europeans as well as Irish people should be grateful.
His concern for national issues and for the good of society was combined with a most active and energetic concern for his constituents - to whose interests he was devoted, going far beyond the call of duty to help them with their problems.
Although a reluctant politician in later years - it was with difficulty that he was persuaded to contest the election of 1997 - he nevertheless proved his worth once again by making the Dáil more relevant through his energetic and skilful chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee during the DIRT Tax Inquiry.
In the face of his devastating illness in recent years, he showed immense courage, and his wife Patsy and his children will have the warm and deep sympathy of all who knew him.
Garret Fitzgerald