The Tanaiste admitted to her party's TDS and Senators yesterday that she had been wrong not to have consulted all of them before agreeing to the nomination of Mr Hugh O'Flaherty as vice-president of the European Investment Bank.
In a 10-minute contribution at the start of yesterday's Progressive Democrats parliamentary party meeting, Ms Harney acknowledged the strong opposition to the appointment within her party. She agreed it had been a major error not to consult with all TDs and senators before deciding not to veto the controversial nomination.
The party's four TDs and three of its Senators - Senator John Dardis had other commitments and was not present - met for an hour and a half yesterday morning to discuss the controversy that has convulsed the party for five days, since the nomination was announced. Unusually, party advisers and officials were excluded from the meeting.
The Minister of State, Ms Liz O'Donnell, said that the main cause of her annoyance was that alone of the party's four TDs, she had not been told of the nomination before Friday last. She also said she thought the nomination was unsuitable.
Senators Helen Keogh, Jim Gibbons and Mairin Quill echoed these criticisms, saying that in the current situation where new evidence of corruption in the political system was emerging weekly, such an appointment gave the impression that the Government was not in touch with the public mood, and that the PDs were not keeping faith with the high standards of integrity in political life which they espoused.
Mr Desmond O'Malley and Mr Robert Molloy both confirmed that they had been consulted by Ms Harney after the nomination was first proposed by Mr McCreevy, and they had not objected.
The meeting agreed to adopt a public position of conceding that an error may have been made, and admitting that if the entire parliamentary party had been consulted it would have opposed the nomination. However, the members also agreed to say that they would now stand by the decision.