The great reformer

Ray MacSharry failed the Inter Cert and hasn't looked back since. From humble beginnings, he has been Tanaiste, a controversial Finance Minister and a reforming Agriculture Commissioner.P. J. Nolan spoke to Ray MacSharry at hishome in Sligo.

Ray MacSharry is the only Irish person to have served in all three European institutions, the council of Ministers, the Parliament and, of course, the Commission. He has also been Tanaiste, Minister for Agriculture and Minister for Finance. He started his working career weeding trees in the Hazelwood plantation just south of Sligo town and now he is chairman of Coillte, so it's an understatement to say he knows what he's talking about when it comes to trees.

I met Ray MacSharry last week in the same house he has lived in for the past 30 years. The room we talked in was sublet as an office to a local firm for many years to subsidise his family income when he was in politics. He is very adamant on that point and says that despite the recent reports of payments to politicians, 99 per cent of the people he knew during his career subsidised their political lives through their businesses.

So what about his former political colleague and party leader, Charles Haughey. "Politically, and in any way I ever worked with him, he deserves only credit. I had no knowledge of any of his financial or private dealings; it was none of my business then and it is none of my business now. I have great regard for what he did in his career for old age pensions, women's rights and a whole number of very progressive reforms."

Ray MacSharry grew up in a council house in Sligo. His father was a rent collector for the corporation and his mother was a schoolteacher. He was one of 10 children.

He told me the extraordinary story of his mother who would catch the bus during the war years and go 12 miles to Beltra where she would get on her bike and cycle another two miles to Ballicutranta where she taught. Then she repeated the trek back again in the evening to 10 children at home.

Weeding the trees paid £3 a week, but in the next summers, while at Summerhill College, the 15-year-old Ray MacSharry worked on the rural electrification scheme in the Boyle and Carrick-on-Shannon areas during the early 1950s. He stayed in digs in Keadue and that took £2 of his £6 weekly wages. He bought sheep with the money and rented land. "When I'd come home from school in the evenings my father would tell me so and so was up to say your sheep are in his garden. Anyway, I failed the Inter cert because I mistook the heading on the Irish paper and got 38 out of 50 for my composition, and nothing for the other half of the exam. I swore I'd never do another exam, and I haven't since."

He started working with Cosgrave and Clarke, the livestock shippers, and quickly realised that transport was a major headache. He bought a truck and developed a punishing routine. He bought cattle during the day and then set out in the truck for Dublin at six o'clock in the evening to be back at three o'clock the next morning, and go off and buy more cattle at the fairs.

In the 1950s, Cosgrave and Clarke were part of the new cattle marts that were so strongly opposed by some other dealers. At that time MacSharry was manager of marts in Ballina, Claremorris, Ballymote, Tulsk and Elphin, all at the same time. The marts lost money for the first five years but then they became profitable.

Following a two-year term on Sligo Corporation and County Council, MacSharry was elected to the Dail in 1969. But the victory was marred by the malicious burning of two of his trucks during the campaign; that meant his transport business was finished. "The first time I ever walked through the gates of the Dail was as a TD."

His 20-year Dail career includes the years of 1987 to 1989, when he earned the nickname `Mac the knife' for his strict reign as Minister for Finance. "I remember there were cartoons of me with a chainsaw, but all parties will agree that the reforms of that time were the foundation of the Celtic Tiger we have today. That time was very involved but I really enjoyed the challenge."

Did he ever consider the top job? "Absolutely not. I never had any ambition to become Taoiseach. I had 20 great years in the Dail and I was delighted when I took on the new challenge as Agriculture Commissioner."

The MacSharry reform of the Common Agricultural Policy in 1992 was revolutionary and highly controversial. Was he worried at the time whether he was doing the right thing?

"No, because you have to remember that the position was unsustainable. The 1985 GATT negotiations had spelt the death knell for all protection under the CAP. Too many people ignore what the alternatives were; in a word, disaster. There was no agreement on GATT by 1992 and there were trade wars breaking out all over the place. Agriculture was holding the whole thing up and no one could condone the situation of buying beef at $3,000 a tonne and selling it at $1,100 on Third World markets.

"The key to the whole thing then and now were the protected payments in the blue box. These production limiting criteria were the key to the agreement and I firmly believe that there should be a number of supports that protect farmers both in Europe and in the US. I think the Americans are going to come to that conclusion as well."

The opposition at the time was intense. "I was not bothered at all when they were burning effigies of me because I knew we had done the right thing and it would stand the test of time. It's ironic now that some of the same people who accused me of being as bad as Cromwell in 1992 were shouting `save the MacSharry reforms' five years later.

"The big element of the reforms that got only tiny coverage at the time were the accompanying measures. I had a great deal of trouble changing the mindset of DG6 to allow REPS, forestry, the farm retirement and all the extensification measures to come in. I was accused in one debate of the `Sligoisation of European agriculture'. I regarded that as a compliment because if we can solve the structure and income problems of the people of the West of Ireland in a meaningful way, and take account of the pivotal roles of food production and environmental stewardship, we will have solved the structural problems of Europe."

So have the reforms worked? "I saw a young fellow this morning, one of my neighbour's sons whose father had taken the retirement scheme. He was hunting his 36 cows - I counted them - in to be milked. That young man also has a job. The point is that he now has the choice of doing part-time farming, full-time farming or else going outside of farming. His father has the pension and that frees his son to make the choice that would not have been available to him if the accompanying measures were not there."

He maintains that milk quotas have served Ireland very well and that Europe should think very carefully before they are removed. One of the main dangers Ray MacSharry sees Ireland falling into is that we will get ourselves wound up into a situation where we think Ireland is not getting enough from Brussels. He thinks people should take charge of their own futures. He says the cereal and beef regimes will be proved to be the right strategies in five years time.

On the beef hormone ban and the trouble with America, he says: "It arose during my time as Commissioner. The European consumer said no and we must respect that. The reason the ban came about was because of big scares in Italy. The idea of farmers using anything illegal is so damaging to our image. All it takes is one incident to ruin our image abroad. Eventually, we will probably end up paying a fine to the Americans, because there is no way that the European consumer will accept hormone treated beef from America.

"There is no doubt about it. The quality of life in Ireland is terrific. Don't forget that half the farmers in Ireland have another income. The big question is whether the next generation will stay on the land or go to the town; the challenge will be to keep them on the land. I recognise there are anomalies in the accompanying measures at the moment, and they need to be ironed out. For example, where REPS and forestry are competing for the same land, I wanted forestry to be allowed into the REPS scheme from the start."

Where does he see Coillte going in the future? Is there a possibility of it being privatised?

"There are Government advisers examining the situation at the moment and their report should be ready in September. I think there are very strong possibilities for Coillte. Martin Lowery and his team have done a marvellous job, despite some constraints. We should devise a scheme for farmers whereby marginal land would be planted in partnership and that could provide a pension for a farmer."

After 25 years in public life, and following the end of his term as Agriculture Commissioner, Ray MacSharry made a conscious effort to broaden his horizons and move into private industry. Ray MacSharry will not be drawn on Telecom and its flotation. He is reluctant to talk about Galtee Deer Care, except to say that he agreed to be a director for three years and stayed exactly that long.

He is chairman of Telecom and Coillte and is a board member of London City Airport, Ryanair, Smurfit, Bank of Ireland and Green Property. He still travels extensively.

"Next week I'm in New York, London and Germany, but I am very happy travelling; it's made so simple now."