FORMER TAOISEACH LEO Varadkar wishes he had been “a little bit braver” during his leadership, saying that if he had, improvements in areas such as housing and transport now “could’ve happened five years ago”.
He was speaking on The Late Late Show in what was a varied and unusually candid conversation, which got both laughs and applause from the audience.
On his shock departure last month, Varadkar said he nearly “chickened out” the night before the announcement.
However, it was the erosion of his “political capital” that made him take the leap.
“I felt that I would get to the point within a year or two or three where I’d run out, and it was better to pass on the baton now than later,” he said.
“There are huge numbers of people, not just in politics, but in sport and business and life in general, who stay on for one season too many. I didn’t want to be that person.”
After spending 13 years in government, Varadkar says there was a need for a political “reset”.
He said he hasn’t decided yet whether he will run in the next general election in Dublin West, but that it will be down to “political calculation” of whether Fine Gael can hang on to the seat without him.
On the downsides of being the leader of the country, Varadkar says it’s the long hours and never-ending work.
“When you’re Taoiseach, you’re always Taoiseach.
“You’re always concerned and worrying about the problems the country faces.”
Host Patrick Kielty challenged him on some of the problems that only worsened during the former Taoiseach’s tenure, such as homelessness and far-right sentiments.
Varadkar said: ”We’re never going to wake up in a country that has no problems.
Sorry we haven’t been able to do more for you in the past 13 years.
“What I would say though is that for a lot of people, things are much better than they were 11 years ago when I got into government.”
In healthcare, he noted that “despite [the system's] many problems” people are living longer.
Employment rates have improved, sitting at around 74% now.
Varadkar conceded that there is “always more work to be done”.
On his regrets in office, he said he wished the government had been “a little bit braver” economically.
In 2011 after the crash, the economy “bounced back way quicker than we thought” and, more recently, Brexit didn’t have as significant an impact as was anticipated either.
“We held back on some spending decisions and we held back on some investment decisions,” he said.
A lot of the new houses you see being built now, or some of the new transport improvements … they could’ve happened five years ago, or four years ago.
“The progress that perhaps we’re now seeing could’ve been much further along. Then you would see a better situation with housing, a better situation with health.
“But that’s hindsight and hindsight is 20/20.”
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