George Lee: Vain or Victim?

A mere nine months ago, George Lee was elected to the Dáil. His election was indicative of the mood at the time; the public had become staunch Fine Gael supporters, mainly due to them being "not Fianna Fáil" as much as anything else. Lee, by his own admission, similarly picked FG as they essentially have no prima face stand-point on economic issues like the rest of the opposition parties do, and so would be maleable to his suggestions. This is not unusual; Garret FitzGerald joined FG for the same reason, and nearly managed to transform the party and move it away from it's traditional roots of being the large farmers party. I don't blame Lee for that choice; it makes sense if you want to have an immediate impact to choose a platform that will let you do that rather than joining some smaller party or runing as an independent.

However, FG seemed to give Lee the cold shoulder, and treat him as a sort of circus act. They'd wheel him out to get the crowd in, and then force him to hand things over to the big boys, Enda and Richard, when things got serious. Sure, he's only a journalist who doesn't know anything about politics right? They didn't treat him like a serious politician but expected him to have the loyalty of a serious politician. Big mistake.

Lee is a damn good economist by any measure, as his pre-RTE career shows. Yet FG, were slow to bring him into the fold and let him help craft policy. Why? There's the sense of seniority about politics in Ireland, that age somehow makes you more qualified, that years spent helping people with medical cards makes you an expert on the economy, that you have to do your time in the back benches before moving up. Kenny was presumably wary of the wrath of the other backbenchers if he promoted young Lee too quickly. That would seem to have cost him a great electoral and governing assest.

The worst thing coming from it though, is that now we have a very high profile example of how closed a shop politics is. We all knew about the nepotism, but to see a major political party essentially give up a very well educated, very well known. very intelligent, trusted voice on the economy tells me that these politicians are out first to look out for their own. This is a huge disincentive to experts from all fields to trying to get involved in politics. When people talk about the detachment of politicians from everyday life; this is what we mean! In any business, not only do you want to best people, you promote them when you find them and you do all you can to keep them.

That all being said, I do think Lee may have been a little premature in going. He should have known that politics here isn't going to change over night. He got a front bench offer when he made the threat, and he should have realised the power his high profile gave him to embarass FG. He could be doing something today to help the country but he was too proud and self-rightous to accept the offer when it was made. Who cares if it was made under duress? Practically every decision in politics is made under duress.