Ruairí Quinn's resignation as party leader did not come as a great surprise. He had let it be known that during his holidays he would reflect on the leadership issue, and to me at least that suggested that he was likely to resign. Garret Fitzgerald writes.
Leadership of a political party in opposition is a fairly thankless task, and even for those lucky enough to become Taoiseach or Tánaiste the rewards of office barely compensate for the strain of these jobs under modern conditions. It is not too surprising that Ruairí Quinn should have felt that he had had enough. I certainly felt that I had had enough in 1987. I was then 61 years of age. Ten years earlier Liam Cosgrave had resigned the Fine Gael leadership at 57. And Ruairí Quinn is now 56.
I have known Ruairí since he was an architectural student in UCD, when I came to have a high regard for his qualities. He has been a dedicated social democratic politician and was a most effective minister in the 1982-1987 government that I led. His skill as a caricaturist often enlivened and sometimes lightened the atmosphere of our cabinet meetings.
His successor is to be chosen by all the members of the Labour Party. I have to say that I am not enthused by this method of selecting a parliamentary leader. However, that is not because I do not value the views of party members. Indeed as leader of Fine Gael I was moving towards giving to the party membership the role of choosing candidates at election times, rather than leaving this task to a caucus of branch delegates. And for the first time I gave to the party members attending an ardfheis a direct voice in the election of an important component of the party's national executive.
But the election of the leader of a parliamentary party by the entire membership of a party seems to me to be a different matter. The traditional method of choosing such a leader - which has been to leave it to the members of a parliamentary party itself to choose their own leader - appears to me to make more sense.
After all, it is the members of the parliamentary party who best know the parliamentary strengths and weaknesses of those of their colleagues who present themselves as candidates for this office, and it is they who will have to work directly with the new leader. It simply does not follow that the person who is most popular with the membership throughout the country will be the best performer both in Dáil Éireann, where many of his leadership skills have to be exercised, and nationally.
There is a kind of analogy between on the one hand party leaders being chosen by the whole membership of a party and on the other executive heads of government being chosen by popular vote; as is effectively the case in the US, despite the anomalous intermediacy of an electoral college that may sometimes frustrate the will of a majority of the American people.
I have always been doubtful about the wisdom of the popular election of a US president, a process that often throws up leaders with only local political experience in their own state and little or no understanding of international affairs, who sometimes bring with them from their state teams of political aides drawn largely from their local entourage.
A president chosen by Congress from among its experienced members would surely be more likely to do an effective job in leading that democracy. I suspect many members of the Labour Party might agree with me, even if they may feel that their new electoral system is a good one for their party.
The tendency not only here but also elsewhere to extend the process of party leadership election beyond the ranks of parliamentarians is part of what seems to me to be a trend away from parliamentary democracy towards direct democracy, which could carry with it some dangers.
With the partial exception of decentralised Switzerland, where many matters are decided by referendums, all other democracies leave legislative matters to be decided by their parliaments. For legislation - the making of laws - is a highly technical matter, the detail of which requires expertise. Such expertise is to be found at least among an important minority at least of members of parliament, both in government and on the opposition benches.
Because of the rigidity of Ireland's Constitution, and the concern of some legislators in 1972 to protect it from possible erosion through EC legislative processes, new European treaties have been deemed to require confirmation by popular referendum, although some at least of these treaties may in fact have had no constitutional implications.
However desirable this process may be from a constitutional point of view, the ratification of complex documents of this kind by popular votes has tended to engage a diminishing proportion of the electorate, who are prone to complain that they do not understand such necessarily complex legal documents.
Clearly it is less than ideal to have to legislate in this way, and because some do not understand that this process is needed because of constitutional issues, it seems to have helped to create an anti-parliamentary mindset.
The growing populist tendency to denigrate our democratically elected parliament and government as "untrustworthy" is dangerous, seeming to carry with it an implication that "the people" should decide such issues themselves. Laws passed by the elected Oireachtas are increasingly being challenged by groups who find them inconvenient or unpalatable for themselves.
It was in fact the anti-abortion lobby that launched this anti-parliament movement two decades ago. Having first of all sought to remove the Supreme Court from any role in abortion legislation - that is in fact what they originally proposed to me in opposition 21 years ago - they subsequently went on to try also to exclude our democratically elected parliament from exercising its legislative function in relation to this matter.
Only "the people" could be trusted on this issue, they declared. But the people repeatedly rejected the role thus thrust upon them, leaving the details of legislation on this to be decided by the Oireachtas - if and when it has the courage to tackle what has turned out to be a political minefield .