PROFILE: GAY MITCHELL:To win his party's nomination for the presidency, Gay Mitchell showed the combativeness and obstinacy for which he is renowned. But are these the qualities required in the race for the Áras, asks HARRY McGEE
SOMETIME IN THE early 1990s a world-weary political correspondent watched Gay Mitchell tear into an opponent who had got under his skin in the Dáil. Recalling the incident later, the journalist remarked: “If Gay Mitchell was a dog he would always be chasing cars.”
It was as delicious an observation as it was accurate, for it could be read as both a compliment and an insult.
Mitchell invites extreme adjectives of contradiction, even from his closest supporters. His drive and energy can be forces for good but can also be used for relentless and destructive attacks on enemies and detractors. He is praised for his intelligence, his energy, his assiduousness, his obstinacy, his party loyalty, his passion, his work ethic. But almost in the same breath he will be described as thin-skinned, a mé féiner, argumentative and vindictive.
You don’t have to trawl far into Mitchell’s past to find evidence of his street-fighting qualities. His campaign to win the Fine Gael nomination was fought with typical partisanship and was devoid of the “vision thing” and the “inclusiveness” associated with presidential candidates. He began with a tirade against “blow-ins” to the party ranks. He finished it with an indignant letter to party headquarters complaining that polling research was being spun on behalf of his rivals, Mairead McGuinness and Pat Cox.
“It was a funny contest,” said a colleague. “In all the Fine Gael leadership battles in the recent past there was a high level of passion. They all invoked a fair degree of loyalty. That was not the case here. None of the three evoked any sense of personal loyalty.”
This assessment is a bit unfair. Mitchell’s victory was based on more than the party choosing one of its own over a blow-in. Some pointed to his decision to forgo his future leadership ambitions in 2004 after Enda Kenny pleaded with him to run in the European elections. That act is remembered by colleagues.
“He may be prickly, but there is huge admiration for his loyalty, his pedigree and what he has achieved over 30 years,” says an admirer.
As the candidate of the largest political party, Mitchell should be a racing certainty to become the first Fine Gael president. But some people think the party did not choose wisely. To be sure, Mitchell is the nightmare candidate for some party handlers. “He’s too working class, too Dub, and won’t appeal to the middle classes,” says one.
But when you parse the life you find that Mitchell, at 59, certainly has the CV and backstory to qualify him for the role of president. He comes from a humble background and is self-made. He is a former lord mayor of Dublin, a former TD (for 26 years), a former frontbench spokesman and a former minister of state for European affairs (though never a full minister, a sore point with him). He has intellectual ballast and has been arguably the most able and ambitious of Ireland’s 12 MEPs.
Sharp of feature and slim of build, he is a dapper dresser and is well read. The biggest challenges he faces are to tone down the partisan rhetoric, to become a bit more statesmanlike in presentation and to broaden his appeal to rural and middle-class voters.
Mitchell was born in 1951 in Inchicore, Dublin. He left school at 14 to work in the Inchicore bus and rail works, with plans to become a coachbuilder. In his late teens his industry and brightness were recognised, and he became a bookkeeper in a metal company. This was the start of a long path through night school, leading ultimately to a degree in accountancy from Queen’s University Belfast.
“There is a bit of the autodidact about him. He has gone and studied, and has got good qualifications. He has worked very hard to master his work and subjects,” says a fellow parliamentarian.
Mitchell’s interest in politics was apparent at a young age. He joined Fine Gael at 16, inspired by Declan Costello’s Just Society policy document in the mid-1960s.
“He has a mixture of political philosophy,” says a colleague. “There is the Just Society side, where he does care for the socially less well off. But on divorce and abortion and other moral issues, he would be very much on the Christian Democrat side. He is very conservative morally.”
Mitchell’s late older brother Jim, five years his senior, entered politics before him; both would become TDs, Gay for Dublin South Central. A former TD from another party says: “He was a great colleague for four years and nine months. For the three months of an election it was hell for leather and ferocious rows.”
His outspoken nature and assiduousness did not go unnoticed. He was promoted early in his Dáil career, and when Alan Dukes resigned in 1990 Mitchell was mentioned as a potential leader. In the event, he did not stand. His only challenge for the leadership was in 2002, when he was defeated by Enda Kenny. Along the way he became party spokesman on health, justice and foreign affairs. He was said to have been bitterly disappointed not to be appointed a full minister in the rainbow coalition of the 1990s.
He has never shied away from populist gestures. When he was lord mayor of Dublin in the early 1990s he commissioned a feasibility study to explore bringing the Olympics to Dublin in 2004. Unsurprisingly, nothing came of it. He also mounted a campaign to have an Inchicore street named after the footballer Paul McGrath.
He never shied away from confrontation either. His abrasive manner caused annoyance to some opponents. It led, famously, to Bertie Ahern’s explosive outburst in the Dáil in 2002 when he rounded on Mitchell, saying : “You’re a waffler, you’ve always been a waffler, you’ve been hanging around here for years, waffling.”
“He never had too many friends within the parliamentary party,” says an erstwhile colleague. “He was very much a loner and a mé féiner. He was not a great guy to travel around the country. He did not put the wider party into the equation. He is short-tempered. He can personalise things. He tends to personally take offence when none was intended.”
Such characteristics may have inspired a well-known malicious jibe, often repeated, about the Mitchell brothers, attributed to a former Progressive Democrats TD. It goes: “Gay Mitchell, the evil of two lessers.”
Mitchell has acknowledged his tendency to be less ebullient, more distant, than his brother. “Jim likes a lot of people coming to the house,” he once said. “He likes people around him. I like a bit of peace, a quiet drink, reading a book.”
If he didn’t endear himself to some of his colleagues, he certainly impressed voters. A consistent vote-winner in his constituency, he was one of only three Dublin TDs who survived the Fine Gael meltdown in 2002.
With the party at an electoral low, a reluctant Mitchell was persuaded by Kenny to stand in the 2004 European elections. He topped the poll in Dublin with an impressive 90,749 votes.
Everybody thought his move to Europe was a temporary thing, but Mitchell enjoyed being an MEP more than he’d expected, which prompted his surprise decision not to contest the 2007 Dáil election. He has been particularly prominent in the past year with his bristling interrogations of senior European Commission and European Central Bank figures at public hearings. He also strongly backed Kenny in last year’s leadership heave. That and his 2004 sacrifice ensured that Kenny remained out of the fray during the Fine Gael selection process for the presidential race.
Despite perceived drawbacks, a close supporter believes Mitchell has all the qualities required for the Áras. “The perception of Fine Gael for 50 years was that we were too rural and too local. Now they are giving out because he is too Dub and too working class. There are a number of TDs in Dublin who did not back him because there is a vestigial snobbery in the party. They give out about his attitude, but it’s they who have to change.”
Curriculum vitae
Who is he?An MEP for Dublin.
Why is he in the news?He beat Pat Cox and Mairead McGuinness in the contest to be Fine Gael's presidential candidate.
Most appealing characteristicsHis work ethic and direct manner.
Least appealing characteristicsHis sharp tongue and his temper.
Most likely to say"The only opinion poll I trust is the one on election day."
Least likely to say"The only opinion poll I trust is the one carried out by party handlers."