Times of crisis can reveal the unseemly side of politics

Inside Politics: The frenzy of outrage in the Dáil over the past two weeks at the Government's handling of the statutory rape issue was an example of adversarial politics at its brutal best.

The Opposition parties scented blood from Minister for Justice Michael McDowell and they went after him with a vengeance in an effort to inflict the fatal blow that would finish him off.

The role of the Supreme Court in creating the mess, that of the High Court in compounding it, the handling of the case by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and the Chief State Solicitors Office were all ignored by the Opposition.

The one objective was to damage the Government beyond repair.

Mr McDowell, and to a lesser extent Attorney General Rory Brady, were the targets.

By the time the controversy had run its course, the Coalition had taken a serious hit.

Of course, Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats would have done exactly the same, and probably more, if the boot was on the other foot.

John O'Donoghue's unremitting attacks on Nora Owen when she was minister for justice are a casebook study in no-holds barred adversarial politics.

The destruction of Michael Noonan's political reputation during the controversy over hepatitis C was an example of even more ruthless character assassination.

While Mr McDowell acknowledged during the heat of battle last week that in the past he had been as good at dishing it out as anybody else in the Dáil, there is no disguising the unseemly side of politics at times of political crisis.

The constant barracking of speakers during Dáil debates, the misrepresentation of the issues involved and the ruthless effort to blacken reputations is not pleasant to behold.

There is also the strange lack of proportion in the way that some issues are seized on by politicians and the media as being of huge significance while other issues are quietly discarded.

That contrast was evident in the past few days in the general reaction to the unsurprising, but still extraordinary, statement from Sinn Féin deputy Martin Ferris that he would not encourage anyone with information about the murder of Garda Jerry McCabe 10 years ago to go to the Garda.

Mr Ferris said he himself knew nothing, but even if he did he would not inform on the IRA of which organisation he had been a member.

The contrast between the scale of the attack on one TD for not responding quickly enough to a Supreme Court decision, which he constitutionally could not have known anything about in advance, and the virtual silence that greeted the statement by another TD that he would not in principle be prepared to co-operate with gardaí in a murder inquiry concerning a servant of the State was startling.

The only place where Mr Ferris's remarks attracted notice was in the Seanad, where the matter was raised by Senator John Minihan, the chairman of the Progressive Democrats.

"Deputy Ferris said he would not describe the killers of Jerry McCabe as criminals. He went on to say that he could not encourage anyone with information on the killing to contact the Garda.

"I ask all members to join with me in expressing revulsion at the attitudes adopted by Mr Adams and Deputy Ferris.

"People must take responsibility on this issue.

"Those who form and influence public opinion must apply the necessary pressure on Sinn Féin to name the authorised person in question and to encourage people who have information on the killing to contact the Garda."

A number of senators backed Mr Minihan, with the most eloquent contribution coming from Fianna Fáil's Liam Fitzgerald.

"My republican credentials are deeply rooted in the mountains of counties Limerick and Tipperary," began Senator Fitzgerald.

He pointed out that over the years he had visited the Diplock courts, and witnessed at first hand the alienation of the people of west Belfast during visits to Ballymurphy, Divis flats and the Whiterock Road.

"Notwithstanding these facts, I have witnessed a creeping and sinister movement in operation on this island since the Good Friday agreement was signed.

"Politicians are being continually blackmailed by the invocation of the Good Friday agreement by democratically-elected members of Dáil Éireann and the Northern Assembly as a device to stay silent or else.

"We are being blackmailed by people whose long-term agenda and objectives are not, I regret to note, in the best interests of this democracy and the people of this island.

"These Armalite democrats such as Deputy Ferris and Mr Adams must be immediately and finally called to account because democracy and democrats demand no less."

The response of the Seanad was not mirrored in the Dáil or the media, and Mr Ferris's remarks quickly faded from the news.

His comments had arisen in response to the True Lives documentary Murder on Main Street which was screened on RTÉ on Tuesday night.

That programme chronicled the steely determination of Jerry McCabe's widow, Anne, to bear witness to his memory, and her resolve to keep reminding the Irish people what had happened 10 years ago in Adare.

During the Dáil debate on emergency legislation to deal with statutory rape, Sinn Féin's Aengus Ó Snodaigh was full of righteous indignation at the behaviour of Michael McDowell.

"People are outraged at the lack of good authority, the incompetence, dishonesty and political cowardice of the Minister and his Government . . . The honourable action in this case is that the Minister resign."

This demand for such a high level of accountability from a party that is unwilling to co-operate with an investigation into the murder of a garda, and which wants his killers to be released from prison, tells its own tale.