The Gazette 1996

GAZETTE

JULY 1996

"Pimpernel of the Vatican".

O'Donoghue started in practice with

a Dublin firm, Rutledge Doyle,

which had been founded by the first

Fianna Fail Minister of Justice,

Paddy Rutledge.

O'Donoghue has been highly

critical of the Minister for

Justice with whom he enjoys a

fairly frosty relationship.

After qualifying as a solicitor in the

late 1970s, he joined a well known

Limerick firm, Michael Tynan &

Company. "It was a wide-ranging

practice with a massive rural clientele,

one which had been built up by

Michael and Catherine Tynan

and is

now run by their son

Greg."

"The great thing about the firm was

that one was not forced to specialise.

You could be told one day to handle a

contract for sale, the next day, a will.

Greg believed correctly that people

should be plunged in at the deep end."

Meanwhile, the veteran South Kerry

TD,

Chub O'Connor,

was

approaching retirement. It was late

1980. An election could be around the

corner. It was time to move.

Together with his wife, O'Donoghue

opened a practice in his home town.

He put his name before the party

selection convention. However,

O'Connor decided that he wanted an

encore. O'Donoghue lost out though

party headquarters added his name to

the ticket. Both O'Connor and

O'Donoghue lost out as the party Dail

representation dropped to one.

O'Donoghue returned to help build up

the practice. He had two more

unsuccessful outings and was

beginning to look like a bit of a loser

by 1987 when he finally made it to

Leinster House.

These repeated rejections have left

him with a sense that you can take

nothing for granted.

South Kerry is not your conventional

182

rural district as O'Donoghue himself

is quick to point out. "Tourists have

been travelling the Ring of Kerry and

the Dingle Peninsula almost since

foreign travel began. The people as a

result are more cosmopolitan."

But South Kerry also contains much

rough terrain. It is not an easy place in

which to carve out a living.

"Strangely, I feel a tremendous

affinity with Donegal. If you asked

me to name those who are closest to

me in politics among those would be

Jim McDaid

(Fianna Fail TD for

Donegal South West)."

O'Donoghue's arrival on the national

political scene coincided with a period

of trauma within the Fianna Fail party.

He remains strongly supportive of his

former party leader Charles Haughey:

"I am telling you that there have been

few Irishmen of any generation who

had a greater vision of the Ireland he

wanted, or a greater love for it."

O'Donoghue himself has acquired

something of a reputation as a

! conservative on social issues, a

reputation that he feels is not entirely

j merited.

One of his first jobs in national

politics was when he was asked by the

then Justice Minister

Gerard Collins

to lead for Fianna Fail on Alan

Shatter's Judicial Separation Bill. He

retains great respect for Shatter.

"It would have been expected of me

that I would be conservative." I would

not regard myself as a rip roaring

liberal, but during the 1986 Divorce

Referendum I did not take sides."

"The people have now spoken. The

fact that legislation was published

prior to last November's referendum

meant that people understood, or

should have understood what it was

l about."

! "Irrespective of how narrow the

majority in favour was, the Oireachtas

I has a clear duty to implement the

legislation along the lines of that

previously published."

"As Dev once said at the end of the

Mother &Child controversy (in

' 1951), 'I think that we have heard

enough'."

i These days, however, O'Donoghue's

! mind is directed to the question of law

and order and the operation of the

justice system.

In March, he introduced a new

Criminal Procedure Bill aimed at

speeding up criminal trials. This

proposed a major streamlining in the

whole preliminary hearings process.

While these proposals were opposed

by the Government, the Fianna Fail

Organised Crime Bill is being taken

on board though extensive

amendments are to be introduced by

Í the Minister.

• O'Donoghue has been highly critical

of the Minister for Justice with whom

he enjoys a fairly frosty relationship.

While the Minister has been active in

introducing legislation, O'Donoghue

has hit out at many of the proposals

variously criticising them as either too

trivial or unconstitutional. He was

particularly critical of proposals to

j extend the powers of entry and arrest

without a warrant.

In his view, the consumption of

drugs should be made a

criminal offence along with

their possession.

He does, however, support a number

of other key Government proposals

including the proposed seven day

detention for drug trafficking

suspects.

"No ordinary citizen will be brought

in to be detained for seven days just as

no ordinary citizen will have his or

her property assets frozen."

O'Donoghue points to the fact that

detained suspects will have the right

to a judicial review within 48 hours.

"I do believe that the Law Society

should not have opposed this measure.

The profession does itself no favours

by creating the impression in the

public mind that the Constitution can

be used to shield the guilty."