Former taoiseach Leo Varadkar announced at the weekend that he will be writing an autobiography which will be released in the autumn of next year.
The book will be published by the Penguin Ireland imprint Sandycove which acquired the rights after a nine-way auction.
The deal for the 45-year old Fine Gael politician’s book reportedly involves a six-figure sum.
“I have the freedom now to say things I could not while holding office and I have enough distance to reflect on the mistakes I made as much as what was achieved,” he said in a statement announcing the deal.
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Here are some of the key issues and areas that Mr Varadkar will be expected to address.
1. His Indian heritage
Mr Varadkar’s parents are Indian and Irish. In interviews he has said he eschewed his Indian heritage throughout his adolescence and only came to understand it and appreciate it as an adult.
2. Social pivot
In his 20s, Varadkar was a classic Christian Democrat, a free market proponent and socially conservative. His belief in the free market remains undiminished but he pivoted dramatically on social issues from being a social conservative who opposed abortion and same-sex marriage to a liberal.
3. His sexuality
In early 2015, Varadkar disclosed in an interview with Miriam O’Callaghan that he was a gay man adding that it was “not a secret”. But the knowledge of his sexuality until then was confined to a relatively small group and was not known to the wider public. His public announcement was another sign of a new culture of openness and acceptance in Ireland that led to the same-sex marriage referendum being overwhelmingly passed later that year. His memoir will be expected to address his journey with his sexuality.
4. Early career in medicine
Varadkar had not finished his training by the time he became a full-time politician although he later completed his GP training. Would he have been happy to have continued in medicine? When did he take the decision that politics would be his chosen career path?
5. Straight talking Leo
From early in his career when he attacked then taoiseach Bertie Ahern for being “devious and cunning”, Varadkar cultivated an image as a politician who called things as they were. His public praise of Garda whistleblower Maurice McCabe in 2014 was received by some in Fine Gael and in the media as an indirect criticism of his Government colleague, then minister for justice Alan Shatter, who was later forced to resign after being criticised by a report written by senior counsel Sean Guerin (which Shatter later successfully challenged in the courts). Relationships between him and Shatter are said to have plummeted after the interview.
6. Party politics
Varadkar’s support for Richard Bruton during his failed leadership heave against Enda Kenny in 2010, and Kenny’s decision to restore him to the front bench immediately.
7. Leadership ambitions
When his own ambition to become Fine Gael leader crystallised, the moves he made towards replacing Enda Kenny as party leader after the 2016 general election, and when he began to put his leadership campaign together. Within 48 hours of Kenny resigning in 2017, Varadkar already had an unassailable lead against any potential rival.
8. His time as minister for health
His time as minister for health. Like a litany of other senior politicians before him, Varadkar had a short and unsuccessful stint in an always difficult portfolio. The nadir of his time was when he said in an RTÉ interview that the national children’s hospital will be built by 2020 “short of an asteroid hitting the planet”. By the time he resigned as Taoiseach, the Bill for the incomplete hospital was being estimated at close to €2.4 billion.
9. His handling of Brexit
Varadkar became taoiseach just as the negotiations to deal with the implications and logistics of Brexit were beginning in earnest. He dealt firstly with Theresa May and then from 2019 with Boris Johnson. They held a well-publicised meeting in the Wirral in October 2019, which replaced the backstop with the Northern Ireland Protocol. Johnson would subsequently renege on the deal and the bonhomie of the meeting would not last, with relationship cooling between the Irish Government and the prime minister, and his successors Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak.
10. Covid
Varadkar was on his annual trip to Washington DC in March 2020 when it became apparent that the Covid-19 coronavirus had taken hold in Ireland and required immediate intervention. From the US capital he gave a live address to the Irish public in which he announced the first shutdown and the beginning of two years when – for long periods – normal life and activity were suspended. He is expected to describe the experience of leading the Government through those crucial months. The most controversial moment happened in autumn of that year when he criticised then chief medical officer Dr Tony Holohan and the National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) for some of the restrictions they were proposing, and said members of Nphet would never have to go on furlough like workers affected by lockdowns. He also suggested there was an impression that some members had assumed the role of Government. Last year, Varadkar said he had gone too far in his remarks and apologised for them. “I was very angry at the time at the way the advice from Nphet had changed very dramatically overnight. The Government wasn’t consulted on that. It was briefed to the media before the Government was informed, which left a lot of us very frustrated.”
11. GP pay deal leak
The circumstances around his decision to share the text of an agreement reached with the Irish Medical Organisation over a new pay deal for general practitioners with Maitiú Ó Tuathail, an acquaintance who was head of a rival medical organisation. It led to an inquiry by SIPO which is still ongoing.
12. Coalition Government
How he and Micheál Martin came to an agreement to form a Coalition between the two parties which had been the greatest rivals since the foundation of the State and his assessment on the future of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil as separate entities going into the future. Did he expect the party to perform so poorly in the 2020 general election and to be outpolled by Sinn Féin?
13. His biggest successes and failures
The economy performed strongly while Varadkar was taoiseach and tánaiste but there were very strong headwinds, not least the continuing difficulties with the health services and the ongoing crisis in housing. Despite the additional resources and measures being employed by the Government, homelessness reached record levels under his watch.
14. Personal relationship
His relationship with Matt Barrett and how it changed his perspective on politics and made him reassess his own work-life balance.
15. Standing down
His decision to stand down as Taoiseach at the age of 45, a year before the next election. Was there pressure brought to bear or was the decision entirely his? Was it prompted by the prospect of a tough election, or the decision by numerous colleagues from Fine Gael not to contest the next election? What he plans to do next and if he intends to remain a part of public life. How does he assess how politics will pan out in Ireland over the next decade amid a more volatile political landscape?
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