Brian Lenihan was a superb politician of high intellect and absolute integrity
‘WHAT IS this I hear about you wanting to stay in Justice? I need my best Minister next door in Finance.” That is how Brian Cowen told Brian Lenihan in May 2008 that he was to be promoted. It was one of the defining moments of Brian Lenihan’s political life.
Lenihan actually took a private moment as he walked back to his own office on St Stephen’s Green to reflect on the magnitude of the task he had just agreed to take on. From that point on, however, he never flinched in the extended fight to tackle the massive fiscal, banking and economic crisis he inherited. The task demanded all of his extraordinary intellectual, political and communications skills, day and night, for the remainder of his too-short life.
He was entitled to another moment of private reflection again in December 2010 when he was told of his cancer diagnosis. He would have been entitled then indeed to pass the national burden off to someone else. He did for a moment consider so doing. Close friends suggested he should rest up, but it wasn’t his nature. Public service, through politics, was in his blood. At a time of great personal and national crisis, he felt there was more he could do. He chose to stay at his post.
Brian Lenihan had one of the finest minds of his generation of lawyers and politicians. Lazy suggestions that this somehow made him remote or detached were simply nonsense. He had a passionate interest in people, their views, their concerns and their opinions. Above all he had a real personal empathy for their plight. If he sometimes seemed distracted it was only because, like a computer, his mind occasionally had too many windows open simultaneously, such was his urgency in seeking to solve conundrums and design solutions.
In an era when the integrity of politics was so often impugned, he had absolute integrity. He lived a relatively modest life. His political service was at a personal cost. The trappings of power interested him little. It was the opportunity which parliament and later ministerial office provided to engage with others in tackling social and economic problems, which excited him. He could never have guessed how insurmountable some of those problems would turn out to be, but at a time when many were stunned into inaction by the scale of the challenge, he relished getting stuck in.
He was a communicator par excellence in the Dáil chamber, on paper, on radio and on camera. If he was upbeat in his assessments, or overly positive in making his argument, it was not because, as those seeking to caricature him suggest, he was a brilliant barrister taking a brief. It was because he appreciated that accentuating the positive became a necessity in the struggle for national fiscal survival.
He was not naive about the economic realities but was acutely aware of the damage which defeatism or loose talk could do to Ireland’s already precarious position. In time the extent of the domestic political difficulties and international pressures he faced in his last months as minister for finance will become apparent. He was content, however, to let some of the misinterpretations stand rather than risk adding to Ireland’s perceived volatility, or damaging her relationship with European partners and international agencies.
While Brian Lenihan communicated a sense of being focused, energetic and decisive, he was genuinely open to alternative voices and suggestions. When other ideas measured up to rigorous intellectual examination and could be applied in the real political and economic spheres, he was prepared to adopt the best of them and give credit.
For all of his apparent resolve, he did have moments of uncertainty. He agonised over many of the small and big decisions because he knew their implications. He mastered these moments of doubt by verbalising them in private, bouncing them off many – at times perhaps too many – people.
If he was hesitant to take the political steps necessary to take command of the country’s deteriorating situation, it was because he did not want any sudden political moves at home to destabilise Ireland’s situation by raising further concerns abroad. This also explains why he was genuinely furious at the manner in which the Green Party announced its decision to quit government in November 2010 and why even he, usually so controlled in public, couldn’t hide his frustration.
For all of his commitment to politics and all of the time he gave it, he did have the “hinterland” Denis Healy wished for all politicians. For Brian Lenihan, time off involved enjoying rare quiet time with his family. It also included walking mountains with good company.
He got much pleasure, too, from following politics in all its forms and locations. He was as likely to seek views on the prospects of the British Liberal Democrats in their recent local elections, or the implications of Barack Obama’s changing fortunes in the US electoral college as he was inquire after the progress of Seanad candidates.
Although he was never bitter, that did not mean he didn’t hurt. When cheated of the opportunity to absorb the news of his illness in private with his family over the Christmas of 2009, he was genuinely distressed. In his year-and-a-half in particular he refused to give in to any negativity, conscious that being upbeat was his best treatment.
He worried until his last weeks about his country and about the fortunes of his party. He was shrewd in his analysis of their problems and he still had much to give them both.
Brian Lenihan was a fine friend. He was a superb politician. Above all he was a committed public servant who consistently went well beyond the call of duty.