20 The Sunday Times May 20, 2018 COMMENT

ESTABLISHED 1822 Justine McCarthy Agonising over abortion is I’ll vote yes to make over — now the choice is clear this a fairer country hen the Irish public voted get abroad but with the addition of medi- to legalise same-sex mar- cal assistance at home, legalising abortion riage three years ago, the on demand can be seen as bringing an end sense of righting a wrong to the hypocrisy that has allowed the was palpable. As the flags authorities to turn a blind eye to crisis carried by the victors on pregnancies. Informed opinion leaves no option but to back repeal of eighth amendment the day correctly sug- The repeal referendum is the most gested, it was a rainbow divisive to be put before the people since he pain of childbirth is the most bed and talked so softly to my husband and me married — businessman. I reported it to gardai. Wmoment. This life-affirming event was a article 40.3.3 was inserted into the consti- excruciating pain you will ever have after the first miscarriage. I trusted him Two nice officers visited the woman, adjudging landmark in Ireland’s social evolution. tution in 1983. That was passed by a 2:1 in your lives, my mother used to tell throughout my third-time-lucky pregnancy her to be “not mentally ill”. She made them The outcome of this week’s referendum majority. The social environment has us, her daughters. Coming from and when, after our child was born, he seemed tea and said she could not remember how on repealing article 40.3.3, the eighth changed beyond recognition in the 35 someone who likened the exquisite nearly as happy as we were. And I trusted him she had heard about me, the businessman ecstasy of her first kiss with our father when, clearly devastated, he testified on and the abortion. They told her what she had amendment to the constitution, will be years since, but arguments are as vocifer- to that rare delight of “being hit by a Christmas Eve 2014 in the NP case, about a written was untrue and that it had upset me. less of a cause for celebration, regardless ous as ever. Both sides of this debate have combine harvester”, this was rather pregnant young mother being grotesquely They asked her not to write to me again. She of the result. A vote to repeal, allowing for been advanced in this newspaper, princi- Talarming. She was a woman who believed it kept breathing by machines after being promised. The letters stopped coming. the introduction of abortion on demand, pally by Justine McCarthy and David best to be prepared for eventualities, arming declared clinically dead, in a vain attempt to That’s the thing about being female, you see. will not culminate in the scenes of celebra- Quinn. Those in the middle ground who herself with what, in today’s parlance, would save her 15-week foetus. Your anatomy is public property. Your womb is be called informed opinions. She was a Boylan is one of 1,323 doctors who had the country’s moral bear pit. Your body is not tion witnessed at Dublin Castle. A vote for find themselves sympathetic to the plight woman overflowing with love, too, which is signed up by Friday morning to the pro-repeal your own. You, who spend nearly 40 years the status quo, maintaining the 1983 of women but uneasy at the prospect of probably why she suffered the agony of cause. As a former master of Holles Street, his dealing with periods and missed periods, could amendment that recognised the equal removing constitutional protection for childbirth four times. word carries great authority. He has been not possibly be as “informed” as others, right to life of the mother and the unborn, the unborn must envy their certainty. The The first time I got pregnant, I bought a card targeted for being a prophet in his own land. including the sort of men who avoid eye will anger those who have argued passion- middle-ground voters, represented by the depicting a baby and wrote inside: “Hello The low point came during Monday night’s contact with tampons in a supermarket aisle. ately that women are entitled to decide on “don’t knows” and standing at 19% in daddy. Looking forward to seeing you in nine RTE television debate when John Monaghan, Right now, servants of the state are trying months.” My husband discovered it propped a fellow retired obstetrician, called what was to justify having withheld information from their bodily autonomy and that the consti- today’s Sunday Times/B&A poll of voting against his dinner plate that night. He looked done to NP “noble” and suggested Boylan “go women about their own bodies in the cervical tution should have no say in the matter. intentions, may yet play a vital role in the at me speechless with happiness. I looked back to school” to learn about the foetus. cancer controversy. Their predicament was In the referendum, voters are being final outcome but that looks increasingly back, braced for the body-ripping pain. Mostly, the current debate has been less precipitated by the heroism of Vicky Phelan, asked if they want to remove from the unlikely. All the indications are that the It did not come. Into week 12 of the vicious than the 1983 one, bar the magnified who has shared the most intimate details of constitution the protection afforded the amendment will be repealed — and that pregnancy, there was blood. On my walk to bloodlust images paraded outside the National her life in pursuit of justice. In its laws and unborn under article 40.3.3 and to allow will signal the start of new hostilities. work, I took a detour to the National Maternity Maternity Hospital. What has not gone away in its practices, our state treats women as Hospital in Holles Street. “So terribly sorry,” is the undercurrent that women who argue imbeciles. It treats raped, pregnant children the Oireachtas to legislate for abortion. In In the absence of 40.3.3, the Protection I was told, gently. “It’s over.” I was taken to for abortion provision are fundamentally bad as incubators. Yet it treats barely there a judgment published in March, the of Life During Pregnancy Act 2013 will theatre for a D&C (dilation and curettage) to mothers. The heavily Sellotaped, anonymous embryos as fully fledged persons. These Supreme Court ruled that “the only right prevail. That will remain the case until the clear out my womb. That night, a doctor pronouncements that “your punishment embryos enjoy the protection of the same of the unborn child as the constitution Oireachtas passes legislation. It is unlikely drew a curtain around my bed and talked awaits in hell” still arrive. constitution that enshrines the relic of a now stands which attracts the entitlement that unrestricted abortion in the first 12 to my husband and me so kindly that I cried Some years ago, I received a letter, signed woman’s place in the home. for the first time since walking into the by a woman and bearing a printed residential When I was young, a pregnant woman was to protection and vindication is that weeks of pregnancy, as planned under hospital that morning. address in Dublin. She said she had heard me said to be expecting a baby; not carrying an enshrined in article 40.3.3, namely the proposed legislation, will pass smoothly. I cried for weeks afterwards, on and off. I discuss abortion on a radio programme and unborn baby. A first-time expectant girl or right to life, in other words, the right to be Fianna Fail, in particular, will not add cried at home in the dark. I cried at work in that I was “a hypocrite”. Her letters kept woman was pregnant. Now she is “a mother”, born”. That might seem definitive but the many votes to the proposal given the num- front of embarrassed colleagues. I cried, not coming, a whole series of them culminating in conjuring up a sweet-scented meringue of joy. best legal minds are divided as to whether ber of its deputies and senators opposed because I had lost a child — because I knew, one saying she had reported me to gardai for It allows no acknowledgment of “the anxiety of this means that removing the amendment to repeal. Throw in a possible general deep in my marrow, that I had not. I was having had an abortion in a named Irish reproduction, the oddness of it, and how it crying for our shattered dream; for the family hospital, having gotten pregnant by my feels like dying, pulled inside out”, as Anne will remove all constitutional protection election, and passing the legislation is that, for a while, we were going to be. supposed lover, a named — and happily Enright described it in Making Babies: for the unborn in all circumstances. complicated further. But that is for Then I stopped crying. Life resumed and I Stumbling into Motherhood, the most beautiful If the referendum to repeal article another day. All that is required now is to got pregnant again. This time the pregnancy ode to anything that I have ever read. 40.3.3 of the constitution is passed, the put the repeal issue to bed. lasted eight weeks. No surgical procedure Next Friday, when I go to vote, I will stand international press will declare that Ire- The choice is clear. If you believe abor- was necessary. The kind doctor told us beside Vicky Phelan, Savita Halappanavar, miscarriage was normal; that about one in Ms X, Ms Y, Ms D, Brigid McCole, the “fallen land has voted for abortion. While that is tion should not take place anywhere four pregnancies end that way. women” of the Magdalene laundries, the true, it is not the whole story. Irish women under any circumstances, and fear there Recently, an irate male reader wrote to me women who underwent symphysiotomy have been getting abortions for decades, is nothing to prevent future legislators asking “by what divine inspiration did you without their consent, and men who sacrifice thousands of them every year. The vast moving beyond the 12-week limit for abor- choose yourself” to adjudicate on the facts of their own cosy world for the greater good, majority have travelled to England, many tion on demand, vote no. If you believe abortion when there are many others with In its laws and men like Peter Boylan. of them alone, to end their pregnancies. abortion is already part of Irish life, we opinions “much more informed than yours”. Most people who will vote yes are not in While he was at it, he demanded to know why favour of abortion per se. Many will do so Others have secured abortion pills online have failed as a nation to live up to our did I “continue to quote” Peter Boylan, the in its practices, reluctantly, because an informed opinion and taken them at home without medical responsibility in this regard and that it is chairman of the Institute of Obstetricians and leaves no option. I will stand beside these supervision. Abortion may not be visible safer and more honest to manage crisis Gynaecologists, who has been campaigning for our state treats people to make the future a fairer country but it is a grim reality. By offering women pregnancies at home rather than export the repeal of article 40.3.3? women as for all the children yet to be born, including, in Ireland the same facilities as they can our problems, vote yes. I did not tell that reader why, but I will now. I hope, the future children of my own I quote Boylan because I trust him. I trusted miracle baby. him when he pulled that curtain around my imbeciles [email protected] Now Europe will have to pull off the Italian job Conor Brady Italian governments come and go but the the European Union’s most ambitious latest manifestation of Rome’s famously project. Politics intervened. Italy got a unstable political system has significant short-term benefit of funding its debt Ireland looks other way implications for the rest of Europe. After cheaply — but at a cost. Today the coun- elections that were held as long ago as try’s per capita GDP is lower than in 1999. March 4, a populist coalition is attempting The days of an industrial powerhouse — to form a government, an unholy alliance with Germany, Italy once accounted for while Israel does as it will of the far-right League party and the anti- half of continental Europe’s industrial establishment Five Star Movement. production — are now a distant memory. The coalition’s programme includes While Germany prospered, Italy got mass deportations of about 500,000 poorer. Its leading position as a producer illegal immigrants, a universal basic of white goods — washing machines, income and a reaching out to Vladimir fridges and the like — has gone. Fiat no Putin’s Russia. Unfunded tax cuts and longer dominates the European car mar- The shocking scenes in Gaza provoked words of condemnation but little else spending would require eurozone rules ket. Italy has an unemployment rate of 11% limiting budget deficits to be scrapped and youth unemployment of nearly 32%. or a people who so excel in science, transferring the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the week between ministers and there was initially a call for the Italian None of this was sustainable. If there literature, music, philosophy and the Jerusalem, mirrors Caligula’s policy in AD40. It and Finian McGrath illustrate the near total debt held by the European Central Bank was a surprise after the financial crisis it many other spheres in which the is a calculated provocation and humiliation to impotence of outsiders to influence these to be written off. was that Greece, not Italy, almost brought human genius can soar, the apparent Muslims for whom Jerusalem is the sacred city events. The hardline, coalition government of It reads not so much a manifesto for down the eurozone. Now Italy poses a risk inability of Israelis to learn from history where Muhammad ascended into Heaven. It Benjamin Netanyahu can ignore world opinion is a paradox and a tragedy. has long been shared, albeit uneasily, but with while it has the sort of backing from the United government as a cry for help, supported to the euro — hence the currency’s fall in It is impossible not to admire the an underlying tolerance, between Christians, States that is reflected in the bizarre assertion by voters who have lost hope. Italy is recent days — and to the EU. Its populist resilience, courage and endurance of Jews and Muslims. Israel’s purpose in having it by America’s ambassador to the United failing and many of its problems go back to coalition challenges the very basis of the Fthis race. Persecuted down the centuries, most recognised as their diplomatic capital is to Nations, Nikki Haley, that no other country its fateful decision to join the euro at the EU since the Maastricht treaty and that it terribly in the Holocaust of the Second World show the Palestinians who is in charge. Just as it would “act with more restraint than Israel currency’s inception in 1999. It did not is acceptable for some members to War, its surviving members and their was Caligula’s intention, in having his statue has”. require a strict interpretation of the rules struggle while others lead the life of Riley. descendants constructed a place of safety for erected in the temple, to ensure that the Jews There is almost unlimited support in themselves in their historic homeland. could not fail to understand that they were a armaments and finance for Israel’s military of membership to conclude that Italy In the nearly two years since Britain They have armed and readied themselves to subject people. machine from the US. Thus “calling in” the should not have been allowed into the voted to leave the EU, the other 27 secure it, vowing never again to be left This is grist to the mills of Hamas, which has Israeli ambassador to Ireland or even expelling single currency; its government debt was members have left it to the Brussels defenceless or dependent upon others to come orchestrated the rioting along the border him would be a mere irritant. Yet there is a roughly twice the so-called Maastricht bureaucracy to cope with Brexit. Catalan to their aid. between Gaza and Israel to coincide with the strong public sense that it is wrong for a ceiling of 60% of GDP. separatism, populism in the east and No fair-minded person could say this is opening of the Jerusalem embassy. country that has had its own historical wrong, any more than it was wrong for the And the Israeli security forces, with the experience of repression to stand idly by. At the time, however, it was unthink- Italy’s plight are a few reminders that the Irish, repressed, scattered by famine and war, political wind at their back and with US Some Dail members have already called for able to exclude a founder member from EU has plenty of problems of its own. and humiliated by English rule, to want to president Donald Trump’s daughter and son- economic sanctions against Israel. Even more create their own state. But where many people in-law taking pride of place at the opening so than Ireland, the Mediterranean nation’s sympathetic to Israel qualify their support is in ceremony, have turned a riot into a massacre, vibrant economy depends on trade. And trends its use of tactics against Palestinians. using gunshot rather than non-lethal on social media suggest that more people here Irish people admire Israel in many ways. weaponry. Sixty people have died. They now are questioning the propriety of dealing An end to pain-in-the-neck claims However, anti-Israeli sentiment grows when its included not only members of Hamas but also on normal trading terms with Israel. security forces use disproportionate violence children and first-responders. Last year Senator Frances Black introduced against the very much weaker Palestinian Reports of terse exchanges at cabinet during a bill to support the Boycott, Divestment and population. Sanctions (BDS) movement, which was Meet Whiplash Willie was a 1960s comedy finally forced the government to act. The Every Jewish schoolchild knows the story of established in 2005 to put economic pressure starring Walter Matthau as a conniving average award for whiplash in Britain, the how the Roman emperor Caligula drove the on Israel. But it failed to pass in the Seanad. lawyer aiding and abetting a false insur- outrageous sum which compelled a legis- people of Jerusalem to insurrectionary fury by And governments across the western world ance claim. Now the British have decided lative response, is £1,850, or about €2000. decreeing that his statue should be erected and have shied away from BDS, some describing it they’ve met enough Whiplash Willies. In Ireland, the average is €15,000, but venerated in the Holy Temple, the most sacred as anti-semitic. Concerned at the level of awards for sums of €40,000 and higher are not unu- place in their religion. Caligula died before his Western governments, such as our own, will order could be executed, and the bloody revolt argue that Israel adheres to generally “whiplash”, and other controversial “soft sual awards for an injury which some that would have resulted did not follow democratic values and freedoms in a region tissue” injuries, the UK insurance indus- experts deny exists at all. immediately. characterised by despotism and gun-rule. And try has welcomed the new Civil Liability Under the new UK law, “whiplash” Yet many historians trace the origins of the Israeli security business is business. EU-Israeli trade was Act, which will cap whiplash compensa- awards will range from £225 to £3,275, and catastrophic uprising that occurred 30 years forces have worth €34bn in 2016. We should not hold our tion from next October. will have to be verified by medics from later, leading to the destruction of the temple breath, waiting for some dramatic intervention and the violent dispersal of the Jewish people — by our own government or by the EU. Despite the increasing safety of roads an accredited panel. So how much longer the diaspora — to that needless provocation. turned a riot Israel will continue to do what it does, and cars, whiplash claims have doubled in will we continue to meet our own Whip- What Israel, supported by a bull-headed because it can. Britain in the past 10 years, to a level that lash Willies with blank cheques? Washington administration, has done, in into a massacre [email protected] 12 The Sunday Times April 8, 2018 COMMENT

ESTABLISHED 1822 Justine McCarthy Costs are mounting up for Our star-struck state INM as data scandal rolls on is helping O’Brien ext week promises to be a the attention of the ODCE. The High Court pivotal one for Independent inspector will probe both these cases, but News & Media when the Office most attention, inevitably, will centre on of the Director of Corporate the data breach. Enforcement (ODCE) goes to To date it is known that 19 people were court on April 16 to secure the targeted by the IT consultants hired by The billionaire has been courted by Irish politicians, despite investigations appointment of a High Court Mr Buckley. There appears to be nothing inspector to probe corporate random about the choice of individuals eputation is a funny old thing. I have bailout, to the boards of Topaz and Dublin’s wielders and the 1% wealth club; a precedent Ngovernance at the country’s biggest who were chosen. Broadly, they seem to long suspected that those who shout Beacon Hospital. honoured by when he made his publisher. fall into two camps. Several of them were the loudest in defence of theirs do so O’Brien was one of 17 prominent individuals first trip to Davos as this year where In the two weeks since we first involved in, or reported on, the Moriarty because, in their hearts, they know who produced a document entitled Blueprint he informally met O’Brien. reported this impending court appoint- tribunal, which concluded that Michael they don’t get the love. for Ireland’s Recovery after the financial This starry-eyed dalliance with Ireland’s One cannot say that about the collapse and were among the first into richest native-born citizen has gone on, not ment, a drip-feed of leaks from the Lowry, a former minister for communica- feared libel litigant Denis O’Brien, Government Buildings to lobby the new just against the backdrop of Moriarty, but while 200-page affidavit prepared by the ODCE tions, assisted Mr O’Brien in acquiring of course. The Irish state has been government in 2011. the businessman pursued legal proceedings has appeared in newspapers owned by the state’s first private mobile phone Rlavishing love on the billionaire ever since the Eamon Gilmore, as the tanaiste and leader against various arms of the state, including INM. As such, we have no way of licence in the mid-1990s. The tribunal said Moriarty tribunal found he gave money and of the Labour Party in 2013, participated in a Revenue, RTE and the Oireachtas. It has knowing how much damaging material is it was “beyond doubt” that Mr Lowry loan support worth more than €1m to Michael photocall with O’Brien at a human rights continued while he wrote privately to Lowry, who was communications minister conference backed by the billionaire at Dublin individual politicians such as Renua Ireland contained in the affidavit, but what we gave “substantive information to Denis when a massively lucrative state phone licence Castle, the jewel in the state’s property founder Lucinda Creighton, after she urged have learned so far is alarming. O’Brien of significant value and assistance was up for grabs in the mid-1990s. O’Brien’s portfolio. Gilmore’s party colleague and that action be taken on Moriarty’s findings, and All the indications are that potentially to him in securing the licence”. Mr enrichment of Lowry, according to Moriarty, communications minister Pat Rabbitte hosted to former Labour leader Joan Burton, accusing serious events have taken place at the O’Brien, who disputes the findings, did was “demonstrably referable” to the then a black-tie dinner at the same venue the next her of “vindictiveness” when she expressed company. In 2014, Leslie Buckley, until not enjoy media coverage of the tribunal minister’s conduct in helping him win the year for O’Brien and his fellow dignitaries on “unease” about O’Brien popping up at public recently the chairman of INM, is alleged and was particularly incensed at the licence that formed the foundations of the UN Broadband Commission for Digital events in the wake of Moriarty. O’Brien’s phenomenal wealth. He sold his Development. Kenny, still taoiseach, popped It persisted as O’Brien accused Moriarty to have sanctioned an operation that reporting of Sam Smyth, a former journal- phone company four years later for €2.4bn, into the Shelbourne Hotel to schmooze the of setting out to produce “pre-determined” involved accessing data from the ist with the Irish Independent whose netting more than €300m for himself. international advocacy group, which O’Brien conclusions and of creating “a work of fiction”. company’s server that was then distrib- name was searched for on the database. O’Brien and Lowry deny Moriarty’s findings. headed at the time. He accused the judiciary of bias, saying the uted to third parties for analysis. The The other group of individuals tar- In the intervening seven years, esteem for Kenny again rubbed shoulders with O’Brien reason he lost court challenges against operation was carried out by IT consult- geted in the data breach can be seen as O’Brien has oozed out of every pore of our at the World Economic Forum of global power- the tribunal was because the judiciary put “a obsequious little state. The steam was still ring of steel” around their judicial colleague, ants who were paid by an Isle of Man allies of Gavin O’Reilly, who stepped rising off the report when the telecoms mogul knowing he was not “up to the job”. Not one company controlled by Denis O’Brien, down as chief executive of INM in 2012 pitched up with then taoiseach on judge publicly responded to the slur. a 29.9% shareholder in INM. Mr O’Brien following a prolonged feud with Mr the platform of the New York stock exchange And it went on and on as he issued writs like has not made any comment on the contro- O’Brien. Given the bad blood that existed for the traditional St Patrick’s Day bell-ringing confetti against individual journalists and news versy since it entered the public domain. between the two men and their mutual ceremony. organisations. I know of one colleague who The affidavit details attempts by Mr belief that connected parties on both The following year, the Broadcasting transferred the ownership of his family home Authority of Ireland made a formal out of his own name to safeguard it against an Buckley to convince INM to purchase sides were circulating damaging stories determination that O’Brien’s position as the O’Brien writ. Ted Harding quit as editor of the Newstalk in 2016. The loss-making radio about them, it is not difficult to see biggest shareholder in the country’s largest Sunday Business Post after O’Brien sued his station is owned by Mr O’Brien. There are why the opportunity would have been private media company, Independent News paper. Sam Smyth, who O’Brien sued when he also issues surrounding INM’s €121.3m taken to source internal emails after Mr & Media (INM), and his ownership of the was writing for INM, lost his Today FM disposal of APN, a publisher with assets in O’Reilly’s departure. Communicorp group of radio stations did not programme after Communicorp acquired Australia and New Zealand. Following its When first approached about the data give him “undue influence”, something the station. The media magnate threatened disallowed by law. to sue Vincent Browne personally. sale in March 2015, Mr Buckley attempted breach, Mr Buckley claimed that external O’Brien was a repeat VIP guest at the Now we know that, while the state and its to secure a “success” fee for Island Capi- consultants were given access to INM biennial Global Irish Economic Forum, an politicians were courting O’Brien, one of his tal, another company controlled by Mr emails as part of a “cost-reduction exer- insultingly patronising wheeze where rich folk offshore companies paid for an interrogation of O’Brien, equivalent to 0.9% of the transac- cise”. Not only does that make no sense, networked and took in an All-Ireland final at INM executives’ and journalists’ emails. The tion proceeds. but all the indications are that this “cost- Croke Park while purporting to fix the upshot is that, in addition to a seven-year long economy. The state is investigation by the Criminal Assets Bureau of The proposed takeover of Newstalk reduction exercise” could prove to be an The Maltese tax-resident was a guest of the Moriarty’s findings, the Office of the Director was abandoned and the request for a extraordinarily expensive fishing exer- nation for its official celebration of the Easter levelling serious of Corporate Enforcement and the Office of success fee for Island Capital was with- cise. With the ODCE — and possibly other Rising, commemorating patriots who died for the Data Protection Commissioner are both drawn. For that the shareholders in INM — agencies — becoming involved in the the ideal of a republic that would guarantee accusations carrying out inquiries. other than Mr O’Brien — can thank Robert growing scandal, the costs to INM could equal rights and equal opportunities for all its at an individual The silence emanating from the ruling Pitt, the former chief executive. Mr Pitt run into millions. Legal fees aside, individ- citizens. He was also a guest at Dublin Castle establishment tells its own story. The state is for the state banquet when Queen Elizabeth II levelling serious accusations at an individual was so alarmed at the prospect of being uals who can prove their personal data became the first British monarch to visit the with one trembling with one trembling finger while embracing him told to buy Newstalk for €35m when his has been compromised may be entitled to Republic of Ireland. with both arms. advisers believed it was worth €14m at seek compensation. There may also be He bought the loans of Siteserv, at a €119m finger while There is a wise saying that, if you look after most, that in late 2016 he made a action from shareholders if they can make write down, and the Topaz filling stations, embracing him your character, your reputation will look after protected disclosure under whistle- the case that INM has suffered as a result of at a writedown of about €150m, out of state itself. O’Brien has enjoyed a double indemnity, ownership. He appointed , the courtesy of a yellow-bellied state. blower legislation to bring the matter to the actions of its former chairman. taoiseach who had led Ireland into the EU/IMF with both arms [email protected] Macron gives France a dose of Thatcherite medicine Conor Brady

Emmanuel Macron studied the speeches accept it. The trains in Germany are — dare of former British prime minster Margaret one say it — more apt to run on time, while Ireland is left to wobble Thatcher while on his path to power but a new generation of trains in Italy is more concluded that her doctrines could not be stylish. The Italians have even part-priva- imposed in France, with its long tradition tised their railways, a taboo in France. by Brexit scaffolding of class war. Now the French president In theory Mr Macron’s reforms are has made the test of his reforms a pitched modest. They would shake up working industrial confrontation with the tough- practices, end privileges for new em- est unions on the block. Trains came to a ployees and raise their retirement age. In halt across France last week in a sequence practice both sides know this is a moment of strikes intended to paralyse the of truth. Reform of the railways has consti- nationalised railways for the next three tuted a third rail for French politicians. Losing leverage as the effects of UK’s deal remain unclear should worry us months. This weekend holiday flights are The unions still glory in their defeat of disrupted as pilots and staff at Air France Jacques Chirac in 1995, a rout from which ianna Fail leader Micheál Martin may agreement.” One suspects that beleaguered months. It will take much longer to advance to pursue their industrial action over pay. his presidency never recovered. have a point, and possibly a significant British business organisations might be the stage where it can be considered at A symbol of postwar regeneration, the There are echoes here that many will one, in his assertion that the somewhat sceptical of this cheery news in the parliamentary level in member states. But the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer, recognise. Mr Macron made his first government has made “a major absence of much corroborative detail. But various possibilities will be well understood at known by its initials SNCF, remains a reforms by stealth, changing restrictive strategic error” in allowing the border along with Theresa May’s claim, similarly senior administrative and political level and bastion of unionised labour, heavily sub- labour laws and lifting a Socialist wealth issue to slip down the timeline of the unsupported, that after Brexit there will be will be the subject of continuous scrutiny and Brexit negotiations. “The government’s more money for the National Health Service analysis. Meanwhile, what will happen on the sidised and influenced by politicians. It tax with only minor protests. original position was that the island of and for education, it reflects a strengthening, Irish border, where the customs area and the carries nearly 5m passengers a day, a Now, like Mrs Thatcher, he has opted to FIreland had to be sorted first before we get into upbeat Tory narrative that the road leading to a single market meet the UK’s home-grown rules, number that is growing by about 10% a defy the fainthearts and go for broke. the next phase, the transition and the overall bright, prosperous future for all citizens of the will remain unclear. year. That is testing the resilience of a net- Retreat would put in doubt changes to trade agreement,” he said during the week. But UK is now open. The dynamics of a drawn-out, multi-party work renowned for its flagship high-speed pensions, unemployment benefit and the now, he argues in a newspaper interview, the The outlines of a likely trade deal may negotiation process like this, can be a bit like trains but which dates, in part, to the bureaucracy, all vital to his grand project government has unwisely allowed the emerge sooner than might have been working with wet cement. Layers are formed transition process to go ahead while leaving the expected, given the slow start to the one on top of another and then harden into a 1930s and is struggling to cope with of fixing France’s public finances and finalisation of the border arrangements until negotiations process. Already, some work has mass that becomes very difficult to change. modernisation and commercial change. modernising the relationship between October. “I think they should have held back been done by civil servants in Brussels and Those involved may be reluctant to see The SNCF labours under more than citizen and state. on the transition arrangement.” London, modelling various possible alterations to the shape of what they have €47bn of debt. Its glory days are in the There is no doubt that France needs Overall Brexit negotiations have, in fact, arrangements. The aim on both sides will be to constructed, while resisting and resenting past. Competition is coming under a Euro- the Macron medicine. If the government advanced considerably. Obstacles that initially keep existing economic corridors as open as those who complain that it does not meet their seemed insuperable have been overcome, in possible. German car manufacturers, for particular needs. pean Union directive and, as a good Euro- gives in, it can say “adieu” to its whole almost every case with the British choosing to example, do not want to lose the big UK market This is where Martin’s political nose tells him pean, President Macron is bound to reform programme. climb down. The so-called “divorce bill” has any more than British IT companies want to that Ireland could find it has lost some of the been agreed. There is clarity on reciprocal lose their customer base across the continent. leverage it secured before agreeing to allow rights of residence and employment. The There will be “alignment” in these and other negotiations to advance to the transition phase. United Kingdom will continue to recognise the sectors. Divergences are more likely to occur If the scaffolding is in place for a deal, with all jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice to over standards and protections in agricultural the heavyweights more or less in agreement on some degree. The UK has finally and produce, food, drink and related processes. its essentials, but without any solution to the Teachers skipped class on irony unambiguously declared that it is leaving the And no member-state of the EU is going to be border issue, will the voice of one small customs union and the single market and directly affected by this as much as Ireland. member-state — on the EU periphery — prevail European leaders have accepted this. The stage The broad shape of a possible deal will start against pressure to accept whatever has been is being set for the negotiation, in due course, to emerge behind closed doors over the coming constructed to suit the big players? Ireland A student who told a pregnant teacher So some must have been able to empa- of the all-important future trade arrangements. could find itself cast as petty, obstructionist he would “kick the baby out of her” was thise with the education minister last week Meanwhile, the management of the border and unreasonable if everyone else wants to back in the classroom the following day, a when he was heckled during his address to across this island, with the customs union and strike a deal and get on with things. Yes, we teachers’ union conference was told last the Association of Secondary Teachers of the single market operating on one side but not could call on our EU allies to honour their on the other, remains the outstanding issue. words of solidarity and stand with us, as they week, and it was three weeks before the Ireland. Sarcastic laughter and jeers occa- Significantly, it does not figure as much promised, against the creation of an economic school took action against him. sionally drowned him out as he struggled these days in the public conversations about border on this island. But even if they did, and Stress-related absenteeism is rife in the to hold the attention of a roomful of adults. Brexit in the UK. The focus in the British media The focus in the if the whole deal were to unravel, with the UK education sector, the conference heard, The irony of the same adults’ com- now is on future trading deals with the EU and crashing out of Europe with no agreement, because of schools’ failure to implement plaining of the same behaviour from those other states. Liam Fox, the trade secretary, British media is some would try to lay the blame and the codes of acceptable behaviour. By all young people to whom they should be says the UK will have deals in place with 70 obloquy for the ensuing economic chaos, countries by the end of the transition phase in not on the border firmly at Ireland’s doorstep. And we would accounts, teachers are regularly subjected setting a good example was clearly lost on 2020. All of these have already been “spoken suffer for it. to verbal abuse and disruptive behaviour. our highly educated educators. to” he says, and “they have all given but future trade [email protected] 14 The Sunday Times March 25, 2018 COMMENT

ESTABLISHED 1822 Justine McCarthy Kicking digital levy into touch Women are their could come back to haunt us own worst enemies ith its shares tanking and fore in assembling the “coalition of the outrage at the manner in unwilling” is nothing to be proud of, how- which 50m customers had ever. When it comes to facilitating Big their personal details “har- Tech, this country has a history of bend- vested” to create advertis- ing over backwards. Our government ing messages for political agreed a tax-avoidance scheme with Misogyny rules in Rome until we stop harshly judging one another purposes, Facebook has Apple that resulted in a European Com- had a week to forget. The mission (EC) investigation, and a finding letter writer to a daily newspaper Newstalk last year after suggesting on his radio been paid to our understanding of femininity. Wonly good news for the company was that that the American company owed €13bn recently excoriated former president programme that a raped woman should share Compassion, for example, is presumed to be a the EU suffered a serious setback in its in past taxes, plus negative publicity on an Mary McAleese for her speech in the blame, some women complained he was particularly feminine trait but women often attempt to impose a 3% digital tax on the unprecedented scale. Rome which labelled the Catholic being subjected to “a witch hunt” and being show a cruel lack of it for each other. European revenues of the world’s Ireland was within its rights at the time church an “empire of misogyny”. The “crucified” on the altar of political correctness. The Catholic view of female subservience so-called tech giants. The proposal to to cut a deal with Apple, and the EC deci- correspondent claimed that “none of Women are other women’s harshest judges. was summarised by St Thomas of Villanova introduce the levy required the unani- sion is subject to appeal. But the world has the many thousands of female saints” Studies have found, for instance, that male- when he said: “Humility is the mother of many had ever challenged the church, and dominated juries are more likely to produce a virtues because from it obedience, fear, mous backing of all 28 member states in moved on, tech companies have become Aattributed McAleese’s critique to “hubris”. In guilty verdict in sexual-assault trials than juries reverence, patience, modesty, meekness and order to come into force. Instead, it was even more powerful, and the public mood other words, the canon lawyer, professor of with a predominance of women. Rape and peace are born.” He said the humble “easily strangled at birth by a “coalition of the has turned. Instead of recognising this criminal law, former university pro-vice Justice in Ireland, a 2009 study, analysed the obeys everyone, fears to offend anyone”. The unwilling”, smaller EU countries who, for shift, Ireland’s establishment remains in chancellor and, for 14 years, the head of state, verdicts and gender compositions of 108 trial words on a recyclable carrier bag spotted at the various reasons, opposed the measure. thrall to Big Tech. That is why the govern- had gotten above her station. For a Catholic juries. It found 17% of those juries had more International Eucharistic congress in Dublin six woman, lack of humility is a big, fat mortaller. women than men and not one of them resulted years ago put it more succinctly. “Use me again Talk about an own goal. Tech behe- ment did everything in its power to ensure What was most demoralising was that the in a conviction. and again,” it said. Thus does a divide-and- moths — particularly Apple, Facebook and there would be no movement on a pro- letter was written by a woman. Nor was she It has been argued that the 32 TDs who voted conquer philosophy sustain a ruling culture of Google — have been making mugs of gov- posal that would have boosted the tax alone. Another female correspondent praised against the holding of a referendum on the prejudice and bigotry. ernments around the world by utilising income of the European partners who the treatment of women within the Catholic eighth amendment made a fundamentally By Thomas’s measure, McAleese, Winfrey tax strategies that result in them paying have suffered most from the aggressive church — the same institution that forbids anti-democratic choice. But what does it say and Atwood are about as feminine as Clint insultingly small revenues to national cof- tax planning of digital companies. women to be priests, bishops, cardinals, popes about the four of them who are women? Does it Eastwood on a stallion in hot pursuit on the or even mere deacons; which deems the mean they are opposed to women having Great Plains. Women, like children, ought to be fers. The modest proposal to levy a 3% tax Leo Varadkar explained his dismissal purging of female pronouns from its missal to bodily integrity or exercising the right to seen and not heard. Their suffering in silence on their European sales would have raised of the digital levy on the grounds that the be “progress”; and which runs its own choose? Carol Nolan, 39, of Sinn Fein and keeps their mouthy upstart sisters down. an estimated €5bn, to be distributed to EU issue should be dealt with globally by the unapologetically sexist state. Not to mention Fianna Fail’s Margaret Murphy O’Mahony, 49, Fear of being considered unfeminine is an member states on the basis of where the Organisation for Economic Co-operation the blessing it gave to the Magdalene laundries, , 39, and , 51, are obstacle to women rising up together. Many tech companies’ customers are located. and Development, elevating our national the Tuam babies and symphysiotomy. modern women smart enough to get selected girls grow out of this fear as life opens our eyes How can women be in such denial about the by their parties and then elected to the national to the reality that, in the greater scheme of The measure as proposed was crude, but penchant for kicking the can down the cultural prejudice and institutional parliament, where female deputies account for things, justice is more valuable than self- why should that matter considering the road to international levels. There is still a discrimination that limits not just their own just 22% of the total. If faced with a 12-year-old effacement. There are other women, however, manner in which tech companies, with possibility France and other likeminded potential in life but the lives of their daughters, girl made pregnant by a violent gang rape and who remain steeped in the doctrine of their seemingly unlimited resources, have countries will go ahead with the plan — at sisters, mothers and friends? pleading to have it terminated, I doubt any one victimhood. It is because of women like these stretched tax planning to breaking point? least nine countries need to be in agree- No doubt, those evidently articulate women of them would lack the compassion to accede. that the Catholic authorities feel they can go on With stock market values greater than the ment to enter into a form of “enhanced who took the trouble to write their Yet they voted against allowing the people to treating half the population as simpletons. denouncements of McAleese hold their views consider the matter in the ballot box. Their paralysing condition was recognised GDP of some countries, Big Tech has co-operation” — but the odds are slim. sincerely. So too, one must suppose, do the What underlies all these issues — the by Pope John XXIII when he wrote in a 1963 swatted aside national governments and Mr Varadkar and this country may women in America who squeezed into skin- church’s misogyny, women voting for Trump encyclical about “the long-standing inferiority devastated traditional industries in their have cause to regret his decision to tight, pink T-shirts emblazoned with the slogan and the resistance to women making decisions complex of certain classes because of their quest for global domination. They play by eschew the opportunity to draw a line in “Trump that bitch” and chanted “lock her up” about their own bodies — are society’s economic and social status, sex, or position in their own rules, so the EU is within its the sand. The real tax threat comes from every time Donald Trump, a self-confessed conflicting definitions of femininity. In recent the state, and the corresponding superiority “pussy” groper, mentioned “crooked Hillary” decades, there has been intermittent debate complex of other classes”. rights to make up some of its own. the push by Europe’s biggest players to [Clinton] during the presidential election. about the threat posed by liberalism to classic Where John XXIII erred was in his belief that Long before last week’s revelations introduce the consolidated corporate tax Catholic women who denounce McAleese’s concepts of masculinity, but little attention has the subservience of the oppressed was “rapidly about Facebook, it was apparent that the base, creating a single set of rules on how constructive criticism would be horrified to be coming to an end”. tech giants needed to be reined in. That’s EU-based corporations calculate their bracketed with Women for Trump. As far as Some of McAleese’s critics have accused her easier said than done. Lobbyists working taxes. It has the potential to destroy this sweeping stereotypes go, you could hardly find of pursuing her own advancement. That she is for the tech sector would have assured country’s tax base, with estimates that we a greater contrast than the one between the better qualified than many bishops to run the pious former and the brash latter. Yet they have church strikes fear, not encouragement, in their clients they had nothing to worry could lose €4bn of corporate tax following one crucial common denominator: their other women who feel the ground crumbling about. When it comes to introducing its introduction. protestations facilitate the continuation of beneath them. EU-wide tax measures, Europe has Agreeing a digital levy that would have injustices against women. Acquiescent women Until we accept that real women care about proved to be hopelessly divided. That the cost us about €250m would have been the are the glue holding together the increasingly Fear of being each other, misogyny will thrive in Rome, digital tax levy crashed and burned at last cheapest way of securing powerful shaky facade of our unfair, patriarchal world. considered Trump in Washington, and inequality in our week’s EU summit was not totally unex- allies for more important battles in post- For every #MeToo movement, there is a boardrooms and on our statute books. Women critical mass of women who will defend the need to stop being each other’s worst enemies. pected, therefore. That Ireland was to the Brexit Europe. errant system to the death. For every McAleese unfeminine We need to come together. When we do, let the or Oprah Winfrey or Margaret Atwood, there first item on the agenda be agreement that are other women who can see no wrong in the blocks women getting above our station is not a sin. It is status quo. rising together our ambition. Taoiseach’s spin machine When George Hook was suspended by [email protected] needs to adjust programme

The Dail’s decision to vote for the dis- online — effectively used taxpayers’ funds Conor Brady bandment of the government’s strategic to promote the government, and in partic- communications unit (SCU) does not ular the part of the government. threaten the future of the Fine Gael-led When some of the material that found its minority government, but it is certainly way into the media was disguised to make Parties can’t play Russian an embarrassment for the taoiseach. it look like genuine editorial coverage, it The SCU has been under pressure only compounded public suspicions that following stories in The Sunday Times the SCU was up to no good. and The Times Ireland that highlighted The controversy surrounding the SCU roulette with our security the questionable promotional methods has been a godsend for opposition parties. used to publicise Project Ireland 2040, Flummoxed by Mr Varadkar’s growing a €115bn capital spending plan, and appeal, they have been given a rare oppor- Creative Ireland, an earlier campaign tunity to mount their high horses. The “designed to promote individual, commu- latest Sunday Times/B&A poll shows the nity and national wellbeing”. taoiseach’s approval rating had risen to Fine Gael insists that, when it comes to 59% even though his party’s ratings fell Leaving defence issues in the hands of securocrats alone is dangerous the SCU, its motives are pure. Given the four points from our poll a month earlier. number of messages being promoted by Mr Varadkar has the X factor; now he needs here is to be a “security assessment” concealment around their activities. It also Senior officials and security chiefs appear various government departments, there to make sure it translates into additional of Russian diplomats and their suits the government. No question raised on before elected representatives to give an was a compelling argument for having votes for his less charismatic colleagues. activities in Ireland, the taoiseach has the floor of the Dail or Seanad pertaining to account of their work. At Westminster, the said, to assess whether they are national security will be answered by the intelligence and security committee oversees one agency responsible for co-ordinating Sinn Fein’s successful private mem- working covertly as intelligence minister for justice or the minister for defence. the operations of MI5, MI6, GCHQ plus the that output. Strategically, that makes ber’s motion to disband the SCU was agents. Leo Varadkar struck quite The garda commissioner is answerable to Defence Intelligence staff and joint intelligence sense. What a pity then that the execution really about cutting Mr Varadkar, the a different tone last Friday compared the Policing Authority in relation to civil committee. Most of these proceedings are has been such a shambles. tallest poppy in the Dail, down to size. The with the statement given just over policing matters. But legislation puts security conducted behind closed doors with members The creation of the SCU was one of Leo taoiseach has already made it clear he has Ta week earlier to this newspaper’s security beyond the authority’s remit, so the bound by official secrecy legislation. Varadkar’s first decisions on becoming no intention of scrapping the unit, prom- correspondent. Our reporter had asked the commissioner cannot be asked questions Similar arrangements operate between Department of Justice whether it had refused about it. Similarly, there is no forum or channel parliaments and state security agencies across taoiseach, indicating where his priorities ising instead that there will be greater permission for the Russian embassy in Dublin through which the performance of the Defence the EU. Further afield, Australia has had a joint lay. The opposition immediately dubbed scrutiny of its operations and manage- to establish an office for its security service, Forces’ intelligence can be evaluated. committee on intelligence and security since it “Leo’s spin machine” and subsequent ment. He has also commissioned a review Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti, one of the The complacency of politicians, of all 2001. New Zealand’s intelligence and security events proved them largely correct. of the SCU, which is being carried out by successor agencies to the Soviet-era KGB. shades, around these arrangements is curious. committee, comprising representatives of both The “no expense spared” launch of Martin Fraser, the state’s top civil servant. “It is longstanding policy not to comment on There are Oireachtas committees for just about government and opposition parties, has the arrangements that the authorities may put everything else. The garda commissioner can operated since 1996. Canada has had a national Project Ireland 2040 last month was, as That inquiry report, which will be pub- in place in this regard as it would be contrary be brought into the committee on justice and security and intelligence committee at Ottawa we noted at the time, nothing less than a lished this week, is intended to draw a line to the public interest,” it said. equality, and questioned about traffic policing since last year. Irish parliamentarians seem to Fine Gael election manifesto. The €1.5m under recent controversies. Mr Fraser The department clearly has no doubt about or the operation of the Templemore canteen. be more or less alone in the western world in publicity that accompanied the launch — needs to be unequivocal about the SCU’s what constitutes the public interest and what But nobody can ask him if he has what he needs taking the view that threats to public security including campaigns in national print failings, and highly prescriptive about its would be contrary to it, which apparently to keep tabs on Islamic extremists, foreign are none of their concern, and that such media, local print media, cinemas and future role, if that is to be accomplished. includes any comment on “arrangements” intelligence operatives or cyber-terrorists with matters are better left to gardai, the army and pertaining to security. This is sacred dogma in the capacity to paralyse infrastructure. civil servants, with no questions asked. the Department of Justice. Parliamentarians in almost every After last year’s terror attacks in Manchester I once put it to a former senior official there democracy across the western hemisphere and London, Leo Varadkar spoke about that the Oireachtas ought to have an equivalent think differently. The US Congress has both the establishing a committee modelled on Britain’s of the intelligence and security committees house committee on homeland security and Cobra group. Not much has been heard of it Sinn Fein must clip tweeters’ wings that operate in parliaments elsewhere. He was the house committee on armed services. since, and nobody in the opposition seems to aghast. Why would such a thing be necessary, think it worth following up. A newly installed he asked. Because there is no parliamentary taoiseach may not have been aware a national oversight of security issues, I replied. Our security committee, chaired by the secretary- For the second time this year, a Sinn Fein Mary Lou McDonald’s feeble response to elected representatives have no way of general of his own department, has operated member has been suspended for three Senator Máire Devine’s endorsement of a knowing how effectively our security agencies for many years. But it simply comprises gardai, are operating. Can they meet possible threats? military and civil servants talking to each other. months for posting an offensive tweet. post describing murdered prison officer Are they adequately resourced and funded? Security, as other democracies understand, And, once again, the party leadership has Brian Stack as a “sadist”. But, the ex-official insisted, the minister has is too important to be left to securocrats alone. erred on the side of leniency. A three-month suspension with full knowledge of everything and can act if To be able to operate at optimum effectiveness, It took 10 days of pressure for Sinn Fein pay doesn’t exactly betoken a new leader necessary. As Frances Fitzgerald’s evidence at It suits security elected representatives and security to accept that Barry McElduff had to keen to wield a new broom. A dismissal the Disclosures tribunal has shown, this is not services to professionals need to inform and engage with resign as an MP for posing with a loaf of might have slapped down any further quite true. And should a couple of justice each other. Sitting in wilful ignorance, knowing ministers — Seán Doherty and Ray Burke — nothing and leaving it to the media to ask Kingsmill bread on his head on the disciplinary issues. As, indeed, would the have been trusted with knowledge of anything? have a blanket questions, is a serious and shameful abdication anniversary of the eponymous massacre. imposition of a “parental advisory” filter It suits the civil servants and the security of political responsibility. It faces another prolonged battle after on the offender’s Twitter account. services to have an absolute blanket of of concealment [email protected]