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CHARLIE HAUGHEY IS as controversial in death as he was in life.
His name has made the front pages over the past three days after a new claim emerged that he was beaten with an iron bar in a pub row on the morning of the Budget announcement in April 1970.
The story, published in a new book about the legendary civil servant TK Whitaker, has been denied by Haughey’s family, and there is now confusion as to who exactly made the claim – and whether there is any truth at all to it.
Here’s what we know (and what we don’t know)…
What’s this about Charlie Haughey missing his own Budget speech?
The Budget announcement of 22 April 1970 was the ‘Budget Without A Minister’ as Charlie Haughey, finance minister of the day, was unable to make the Dáil speech, forcing taoiseach Jack Lynch to deliver the annual announcement instead.
What happened to Haughey?
According to widespread media reports at the time, Haughey had fallen off his horse while riding at his home in Kinsealy that morning. The story has gone down in Irish political folklore.
RTÉ’s archive even has video of Haughey’s election Patrick O’Connor making a statement to the media outlining the extent of the minister’s injuries which included concussion, a fractured skull, a torn right eardrum, a broken collarbone and a fracture in one of the bones in his back.
Here is Haughey (right) with his arm in a sling a few weeks after the incident when he was sacked as Finance Minister over the Arms Crisis.
But what’s this about Haughey being beaten in a pub?
At the weekend, the Irish Independent reported a new claim being made in the book about TK Whitaker, a former secretary general at the Department of Finance and a man credited with being the ‘architect of modern Ireland’, that Haughey was in fact beaten with an iron bar in a pub row that morning.
The book - TK Whitaker: Portrait of a Patriot by Anne Chambers – quotes Whitaker as saying that Haughey was injured after a severe beating inflicted by unknown persons in a pub on the morning of Budget day.
Dr Whitaker is quoted in the book as saying: “His injuries were so severe – an iron bar having been used by his attacker or attackers – that he had been admitted as an emergency case to the Mater Hospital.”
Are the claims true?
Well, the Haughey family have “categorically” stated that version of events is “completely and utterly untrue”. In a statement issued on Sunday, his relatives said:
On the morning in question Mr Haughey was returning to the stables in Abbeville on his horse. He grabbed an overhead drainpipe to dismount from the horse and it reared up and jumped forward when the pipe broke. Mr Haughey fell from the horse and became unconscious.
The family said that the new claims had caused great distress to Haughey’s wife, Maureen, and family.
What has the book’s publisher said?
Rather embarrassingly, the book’s publisher, Doubleday Ireland (part of Transworld Ireland), has been forced to clarify that the iron bar beating claim was incorrectly attributed to TK Whitaker in Portrait of a Patriot.
In fact the claim should have been attributed – as a direct quotation – from the book Jack Lynch: A Biography by Professor Dermot Keogh.
“The author and publishers wish to clarify that due to a reference error in the endnotes, the words were incorrectly attributed to Dr. Whitaker. The reference will be amended accordingly in future editions of the book,” the statement added.
The source of the claim in the Jack Lynch biography is not known. We’ve attempted to contact the book’s author, Professor Keogh, this morning but to no avail.
What about Anne Chambers, the author of Portrait of a Patriot?
We’ve asked for an interview with Chambers but have received a response to indicate it’s unlikely she’ll be speaking about the matter.
So, was Charlie Haughey beaten-up in a pub on the morning of Budget day in 1970?
As intriguing as the claim is, it does not yet appear to be backed up by any solid evidence. It is worth noting that throughout this period, Haughey and others in the Fianna Fáil government were embroiled in what became known as the Arms Crisis – the alleged attempt to illegally import arms for the IRA into Northern Ireland.
Haughey and his fellow Cabinet minister Neil Blaney were sacked by Jack Lynch on 6 May after they refused to resign. Another minister, Kevin Boland, resigned in protest, claiming that Lynch and most of the Cabinet knew about the arms import plan all along. Haughey and Blaney later went on trial and were acquitted.
But as for whether he was beaten in a pub with an iron bar on the morning of Budget day, all of the evidence so far indicates it’s more likely that Haughey did fall of a horse on the morning of 22 April 1970 as his family maintain, and as was widely reported at the time.
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Bout time really. You can a have a drink when you arrive.
@DaisyMay:
It’s a shame that this ban had to happen at all. One of the pleasures of going to the continent is being able to grab a cold bottle of beer from the subway in, say, Berlin, and sipping it on the choo choo at the start of your night out.
Boozing in public CAN be a relatively innocent, joyous, totally acceptable thing. It’s a shame it doesn’t seem to work with our mentality. Often sipped a can on the way into town for a night out and saw nothing wrong with it.
@DaisyMay: If they introduce a ban before a certain time at Dublin airport that will be just not on. Allow people get a pint, if you are close to or intoxicated at boarding,you should be refused travel. But dont be a dullard asking for bans to deal with a minority of winos.
And who’s going to enforce it? There’s barely any staff other than the driver on most trains.
@Shane Fleming: Intercity trains more often than not have a ticket inspector on board.
@Shane Corry: very seldom
@Shane Corry: who’s going train and to bring his karate up to black belt level enabling him to deal with drunken gurriers?
@Shane Fleming: I know, enforce a drinking ban? They won’t even enforce a seat booking.
@Andy Butler: Unlikely but they can call for security / Gardai to be waiting for them when they get off / another station. That’s what the drivers do when they get a call through the intercom about mis-behaved passengers.
@Shane Fleming: They will be bound to enforce it. Complaints from public followed by, eventually, irish rail making this decision.
They can’t back off from having extra staff/security on the specified trains.
Drinks brought on board will be confiscated. Best of luck.
Should be banned on all trains!
Oh Irish Rail, this shows another way that you are so far behind any real decent service in Europe.
Whilst I dont like poor behaviour from passengers when I’m on one of your trains, and feel that is a problem if not dealt with properly, I also must point out that the majority of passengers are behaved and act responsibly.
Why are the rest of us decent passengers punished for a minority.
Why not just deal with the unruly passengers, call the Gardai and have them met the train at the next station, the Gardai can remove these passengers and that takes care of that.
If this happens, people will know to behave. We all have to respect Irish Rail, its passengers and show a level of mature/decent behaviour. If this was to take place, no more drunken/unruly passengers.
I appreciate the Gardai are lacking in numbers, but this adds to the wider problem of not having a decent Police force to act on such matters.
How would Germany, France, Hungary, Portugal, Slovenia deal with this issue? They would get their respective Police force to take care of it, thus leaving the rest of the passengers free to carry on their journey and if they so wished to have a drink.
Common sense is not so common in Ireland, we are way behind lots of countries in Europe, instead of dealing with the problems we face, we take the easiest and less fuss way.
Irish Rail show some balls and deal with this properly and stop hiding behind your failure to deliver a service and treat the majority with more respect and not punish everyone.
@Si Mon: Couldn’t agree with you more. The majority being punished because of the actions of our neanderthal population. Easier to make sweeping laws that affect everyone rather than deal with the issue at hand.
@Si Mon: there will more often than not people out of order with drink on them on trains and waiting at stations for garda to arrive causes massive delays….then you’d be giving out about trains running late
Ban the carrying of alcohol onto all trains and only allow drink purchases on board the train, would solve the problems. Why do Irish people have to drink at every occasion and trip ?
@finbarr walsh: nearly spilt my pint reading that comment!
@Roger Wynne: what train are you on then haha…
@finbarr walsh: The don’t have to, but it would be nice before travelling for a weekend away to have a glass of wine or a bottle of beer on the, up to 3 hour long, trip. Rather than addressing the problem (yobbish behaviour being repremanded, and possible arrests if anti-social), we try to ban it altogether and ruin it for everyone.
@finbarr walsh: They charge about €6 for a bottle of beer that is €1 in the off licence.
Saw the headline and thought to myself that’ll be Galway and Westport trains. Stag and hen parties gonna party one way or the other. Good luck enforcing
Well, I suppose that you might need alcohol to make a trip to Waterford
@George Salter: Why? From what I’ve seen the town is pretty nice. The county is lovely. Lots of great restaurants too.
@George Salter: I’ve heard Whispers about the locals there, there’s always some crazy story
Love it when people feel they must introduce bans because of the behaviour of a few dopes.
It should be banned on all trains. One Friday on the 18.35 to Waterford I had the pleasure of sitting beside someone reeking of drink. He was swinging from cans and doing dodgy things with the lower right leg of his tracksuit bottom. I am not saying he was shooting up but nothing surprises me on packed trains. Also I have seen crumpled up foil with burn marks in toilets of trains.
@Em Gee: Just remember with this ban doesn’t apply to this train, only the earlier one with no commuters and grannys on it.
btw: they can still shoot up without repremand after this as well, but at least the old ones returning to westport on a friday afternoon won’t have to deal with it.
@Em Gee: SO ban it for everyone because you had one bad experience.. brilliant idea.
Going to be lots more people drinking bottles of ‘coke’
@RogerRamjet: was just going to say that. If you have to resort to finding ways to hide your alcohol, it’s time to seriously look at your relationship with it.
@FrustratedASDMum: thanks Dr Phil
can we get a ban of alcohol on the Connolly to Rosslare trains too?
They should be more concerned about the lack of seats on them journeys then the sale of alcohol.
I like that I got a Smithwicks ad in the middle of this article.
Good luck with that “Boss”. We will continue to drink and smoke as we have always done. It’s a cultural thing.
So the usual Nanny state BS then. A few people display anti social behaviour where alcohol is involved so the majority of responsible adults are punished.
Meanwhile, those that are likely to be anti-social will pay no heed to the ban anyway.
When will people learn that you can’t legislate for stupidity.
I actually heard about calls for banning selfies in tourist hotspots because a few of Darwin’s finest injure or kill themselves while taking them.
They should add a PARTY carraige where you can drink but have to agree to the whole carraige being filmed and mic’d up… would pay for itself in no time
Another example of the rules of society being dictated by plebs. A small minority always ruin it for everyone.
And not before time, nobody wants to be in a confined space near noisy or aggressive people sipping cans of cheap lager.
Easy solution maybe: Arrange for an unscheduled stop at some backwater station on the rail line to which Gardaí can be called to, have them remove the irresponsible yahoos off the train, charge them for drink/drug/public disorder. Release them, leaving them to find their way home from the middle of nowhere at their own expense. Later on, call them back to court attendance in the backwater location. Fine them heavily. Lesson learned and pricey-paid for, no problemo.
@Canny Jem: I agree a hundred percent.. I sometimes enjoy a couple of cans of Guinness when on a 3 hour journey.. usually on my own with earphones in reading a book or magazine.. Again .. it typical Ireland not dealing with the problem at hand … the problem is anti social behaviour.. banning alcohol is not the answer . It’s dealing with people who don’t behave themselves in public.. not just trains ..
Pretty sure they can’t confiscate it if you’re just holding a bag of unopened cans or a bottle of wine for dinner, any experts confirm or deny this?
Alcohol was allowed??!
@Rachel Ray: they sell cans and wine on board
Most alcos on the trains bring their own drink and yes it is a problem but seriously what about the toilets . They are always filthy dirty .
Typical Jackeens
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