We need better, smarter governance to stay ahead of the curve

English-speaking Ireland and its common law system will be at the centre as governments battle the corporations,

TWO Irishmen helped to forge the greatest and most rapacious corporation the world has ever known, and two Irishmen helped to dismantle it.

Richard and Arthur Wellesley, from Summerhill, near Trim, in Co Meath, oversaw the expansion and consolidation of the East India Company’s grip on the entire continent of India, transforming it from a trading body into an empire. Richard was the head of the EIC from 1798 to 1805 while his brother Arthur was the Major General in the army that completed the conquest of most of India between 1796 and 1813.

Many Irish people are probably unaware that Arthur Wellesley was an MP for Trim and later prime minister of Britain, twice — though most people are more familiar of his exploits under his title ‘the Duke of Wellington’ — the man who finally defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo.

It eventually took the deaths of over 800,000 people during and after the Indian Mutiny of 1857 for the British government to finally begin to confront the uncontrolled excesses of the East India Company. The initial campaign in the 1780s to curb them were spearheaded by the two finest orators of the age — the Dublin-born MPs Richard Brinsley Sheridan and Edmund Burke.

The struggle by national governments to control the excesses of big corporation will again be a global issue in the next decade.

Ireland is likely to be the location where many of Europe’s battles with large corporations will take place.

After Brexit, this will increasingly happen here because we will be the EU’s only major English-speaking country with a common law system — which is much more familiar setting for American corporations.

Add to that the reality that Ireland already has a strong cluster of specialisations that include pharma, medical devices, Big Data and IT manufacturing, and it becomes obvious that Ireland will occupy a prominent location where governments will try to curb corporate excesses.

Ireland needs to prepare for this new role by strategically recognising and resourcing specialists in our courts and regulatory agencies.

This is an example of the type of strategic thinking that needs to become our new national discourse. Our national government can no longer afford to be mired in local politics. We need to raise our ambition.

The participation by the Irish judiciary in protests at Poland’s emerging autocratic practices is an example of the opportunities for international participation and influence that EU membership provides. This is what we need to do more of, and do better, but there is a danger that we will find it increasingly difficult to operate at this high level.

As Ireland tries to operate more effectively at this strategic and international level it will become increasingly obvious that our excessively centralised governance takes up too much time of civil service and Cabinet. This leaves insufficient time or talent to spend on serious strategic issues.

As we face into a general election and the associated blizzard of promises, we will hear of many proposals to improve or replace existing arrangements. In this context it is worth reminding ourselves of our successes — so that babies are not thrown out with bathwater.

We need to remind ourselves that, as a country, we recently managed successfully to extract ourselves and fully recover from one of the worst economic collapse that has recently befallen a modern democracy. Our systems of government — political and administrative — were not found wanting, so far. According to the OECD our achievements as a nation include creating the second most progressive system of income re-distribution in the world — with only 16pc of income tax and USC payments coming from the majority [73pc] while the top 27pc of income earners pay 84pc.

These figures offer an even worse challenge to the ‘tax the rich brigade’ when it emerges that households who earn more than €100,000pa [the top 7pc] pay 51pc of all income tax and USC and the richest 1pc pay 26pc.

We have one of the world’s highest levels of participation in third level education, while our secondary students are consistently ranked above average in international literacy, science and mathematical skills.

In terms of health, according to the OECD in 2019, health expenditure is above the EU average on a per capita basis while Irish life expectancy is now above most EU countries and we also have the EU’s highest share of the population that reports being in good health.

As if all of this weren’t enough, earlier last week the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, accused Ireland of being “a strong and confident country, with the fastest growing economy in the EU and more people at work than ever before... all this in spite of the spectre of Brexit”.

These are bad times for demagogue nay-sayers and the perpetually pessimistic who all want to persuade us about how bad Ireland is and that the only solution is to follow their prescription to change everything.

On the other hand, ‘Steady as she goes’ is a hard message to sell, appearing to lack vision and glamour, even though it has the singular advantage of being demonstrably effective and accurate.

A general election offers an opportunity to reflect on where we are and where we want to go next. If the last decades have mostly been about survival and recovery, the next need to be about purposeful growth.

As we become more prosperous, each year provides fewer and fewer relevant examples that we can follow. This means that we need to chart a course for ourselves, especially in a post-Brexit Europe.

Irish individuals appear to have a capacity to perform as equals on the world stages with examples ranging from the 18th Century Wellesley brothers to Phil Hogan (inset) representing the EU in Washington last week.

The next part of our national journey needs to widen this, so that the success of individuals becomes the example for the institutions of our state.

This will necessitate a significant re-think of how we govern ourselves.

As a small country with a limited pool of talent, we can no longer afford the luxury of an overly centralised government.

We must reorganise ourselves quickly by delegating as many functions as possible from central to regional and local government.

We, the electorate, need to demand better, smarter governance — to bring us ahead of the curve. At doorsteps during canvassing we need to ask candidates about bigger things than getting the potholes fixed.

Every one of us needs to ask: “What are you proposing to do to prepare us for success after Brexit?”

‘What are you proposing to do to prepare us for success after Brexit?’