FROM THE ARCHIVES:On the backbenches since his trial for arms smuggling in 1970 and with Fianna Fáil in opposition in the mid 1970s, Charles Haughey planned a comeback for himself and the party with this speech - JOE JOYCE.
SPEAKING AT the party’s annual dinner in the Dublin South-East Constituency, he said opposition could not be just a waiting period but must be a time of creative, forward- looking activity. It was in opposition that the revolutionary extension of the social services, the unprecedented housing drive, the labour legislation, the industrial programme and the political advances of the future were all planned.
He said the guideline along which today’s policies must be developed were clearly charted by the party’s traditional role in the life of the nation. They must be derived from the founding principles and attuned to the deep-down instincts of the majority of the people. “It is important for us in this context to fully understand what Fianna Fáil was when it was given its first mandate in 1932,” declared Mr Haughey. “It was the republican party certainly, but it was more than that, it was the radical party – the party of the people, as well.
“At that time, Fianna Fáil was looked upon by certain sections as a troublesome, even dangerous arrival on the scene,” he said. It represented a threat to the established order of things. That the established order included slums, chronic unemployment, subsistence-level farming and primitive health services, did not deter them from condemning Fianna Fáil for wanting to upset it.
“The many calumnies circulated in an attempt to damage Fianna Fáil at that time, the allegations of lawlessness, of association with violence still have their echoes today. But Fianna Fáil had the trust of the real majority and, because it kept that trust with that majority, it has since maintained a central place in the minds of the Irish people.”
“There is a French proverb which says that the more things change, the more they remain the same,” continued Mr Haughey. “What is needed today is basically the same motivation as that which drove the founders of Fianna Fáil on to set about changing radically the economic and social conditions prevailing in their day.
“It is the dream of carrying the men and women of all the land of Ireland forward in one great irresistible movement to new levels of cultural, social and political excellence. Have we the breadth of vision or the daring of thought to propound the policies that will do that?
“Fianna Fáil came to power originally as a party of new hope and new opportunity for a people in the midst of a world-wide economic collapse and deep political crisis. It had the social philosophy which enabled it to meet that situation and the political faith which made it possible to overcome adversity.
“The economic depression and the political sterility of today so closely parallel those of the early 1930s that the need for the same crusading, radical approach by us in Fianna Fáil as was shown by our founders is self-evident.”
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