Why Woulfe Matters

By Sami El-Sayed

This week, the socialist left will be putting down a marker and moving a motion to impeach Supreme Court judge, Séamus Woulfe, removing him from office. This is about far more than just what happened with Golfgate - it’s about making sure the elite can be held to account. 

But what are the facts of the situation? On 19 August, Woulfe along with over 80 other members of Irish elite society - from government ministers to EU Commissioners to media figures - attended a gathering of the Oireachtas Golf Society in Galway. Just the day previously, the government had announced stronger public health restrictions which prohibited, amongst other things, indoor gatherings of more than six people. The event even breached the previous regulations which had been introduced while he was the Attorney General that limited indoor events to 50 people.

Backlash

When the Irish Examiner broke the story on 20 August, the backlash was swift and severe. Working class people were rightly angry that just a day after fresh restrictions were announced that the Irish establishment blatantly flouted them in an act that could only be described as supremely arrogant. After some failed attempts at covering for themselves, resignations began rolling in. The then-Agriculture Minister Dara Calleary, EU Commissioner for Trade Phil Hogan, and several other significant public figures resigned. Several members of the Seanad had the whip withdrawn - in effect being excluded from their parliamentary parties. 

While others resigned, Woulfe dug in. When questioned by former chief justice Susan Denham he described the original story exposing the scandal as “the greatest load of rubbish ever”, complaining that the Oireachtas Golf society was being “presented like it was the Ku Klux Klan”. While he had originally apologised, he said “I wasn’t sure what I was apologising for” and that “objectively there was no valid reason why I shouldn’t have been there”. Instead he criticised the media and politicians who were highlighting this issue, calling it a “mood of hysteria”.

This response led to further outrage, and meant neither working class people nor his own colleagues in the Supreme Court considered his position tenable. After repeatedly delaying a number of meetings with his superior - Chief Justice Frank Clarke - Woulfe finally met him and was subsequently asked to resign. Shockingly for some, he outright refused. This brings us to where we are - a government that is too spineless to do anything, and the socialist left stepping in.

What this is really about

But the controversy with Woulfe and the motion to impeach him are about more than just his own personal arrogance and entitlement or even the flouting of the COVID-19 public health guidelines.

The government up until this point has been rocked by countless scandals and has suffered a series of resignations and set backs. Its legitimacy is in question and it is increasingly lacking in credibility. The recent scandal around Leo Varadkar’s leaks to the NAGP and the government’s circling of the wagons around him are good illustrations of the increasingly shaky ground that it is operating from. For them to now impeach a judge that they themselves appointed, only five months after the appointment, would be another sign of their own weakness. 

Woulfe is a long time political ally of the establishment and Fine Gael in particular. He was a Fine Gael member and secretary of one of their branches before being appointed Attorney General by Leo Varadkar. As Attorney General his advice was used to block many progressive measures such as introducing a rent freeze or eviction ban, which he claimed was unconstitutional. Having provided legal cover to the government’s ongoing ideological and political commitment to right wing neoliberal capitalism, they then proposed his elevation to the Supreme Court.

It is now being reported that when Fine Gael’s Helen McEntee proposed promoting Woulfe to the Supreme Court she did not inform the cabinet of the others who had also gone for the job, a possible breach of the rules in and of itself. This scandal must also call into question the whole judicial appointment process in the first place. The reality is that the judiciary, as the arbiters of the justice system, are part of the structure of the capitalist state which rules in the interests of capitalists and capitalism. It is a state that is irreparably stacked against working class people and our interests. Each and every judicial appointment is a political one, done in the interests of the capitalist establishment - we need a completely different process which makes the judiciary accountable to working class people and places the interests of workers front and centre. 

Sending a message

Woulfe’s attendance at an event that flouted the public health guidelines and his subsequent escape from accountability would also send a clear message to the countless numbers of employers across the country doing the same; That what they’re doing is fine. Despite over a month in Level 5 restrictions, we are still clocking in hundreds of new cases a day, and public health authorities are expressing concern at the persistently high level of infections. 

Working class people are rightly indignant at the idea of being forced to adhere to guidelines whilst the likes of Woulfe hold on to their cushy, influential and high paying jobs. The impeachment of Woulfe can only be the first step in a new approach that must be taken - taking our public health seriously and taking on those reckless and abusive bosses in our society who are putting profit before our society’s health and wellbeing. 

For working class people, whose top priority is to get this rotten capitalist government out, we must be absolutely clear on where we stand: Woulfe must go. And if he does not resign, he must be pushed out. But we have no faith in the government to respect the desires of the majority of working people, nor confidence in whatever process this government could use to replace him or anyone else we remove or force to resign in the coming years. If we want to end the rule of the golden circle in our society then we need to fundamentally transfer power towards working class people - by building a mass, democratic socialist movement.