In 1944, when France was liberated from the Nazis, its restored republic faced a dilemma. The normal process of law could not deal with the tens of thousands of public officials who had collaborated with the occupiers. So the French invented a new category of judicial chastisement: indignité nationale. It is generally translated as “national unworthiness” but “national indignity” has more of a ring to it. Those found guilty of it were recognised as bad citizens, unfit to hold office.

We too should have instituted the offence of indignité nationale. It would have saved us from the national indignity of having our new government formed by the grace and favour of Michael Lowry.

The third pillar of our republic’s government is to be the man who Fine Gael felt morally obliged to remove from ministerial office and from membership of the party “in keeping”, as its then leader (and taoiseach) Enda Kenny told the Dáil in 2011, “with the party’s desire to maintain probity and standards in politics”.

And the man who Fianna Fáil’s then (and present) leader Micheál Martin pronounced, in that debate on the findings of the Moriarty tribunal, unworthy of membership of the Dáil itself: “We ... believe that Deputy Lowry should consider his position and resign from Dáil Éireann.” Martin supported an all-party motion........

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