It was with great personal shock and surprise and, indeed, sadness that I learnt this morning of the death of Jimmy Tully. All my parliamentary party colleagues were shocked to hear of his sudden demise.
Jimmy Tully was an extraordinary man, as you, A Cheann Comhairle, would readily testify. He served his country and his constituents of Meath for more than 20 years in this House. He was Whip of the Labour Party, which is a hard task at any time, for more than eight years and he was deputy leader of the party, perhaps an even harder task, for six years.
Jimmy Tully was ruthless in debate. He took no prisoners, he gave no compromises, he argued right out to the very end and when the debate was over there was not the slightest shred of personal animosity. He debated ideas, and issues, he did not debate personalities. He was a man of boundless generosity.
He came into politics in perhaps the best way, from his own direct experience, the rural squalor of Meath, the isolation and the degradation of rural farm workers and the hovels within which they had to live. Those hovels produced TB, disease and early death.
Jimmy Tully was without question — I say this as a local councillor, an architect and a politician — the best Minister responsible for housing this country has ever had. He will never be forgotten because there are many examples of his work across the countryside of this State. Nothing was too good for local authority tenants and the best was not good enough to be put into the materials that built the houses in which people now live and rear families. Those houses are along the quays of this city and opposite the Custom House where he served for five years as Minister for Local Government. His passion and commitment to local authority housing knew no bounds and his belief that everybody had the right to build his or her own house and to live in it is, as Deputy Bruton said, a testimony that can be witnessed daily by everybody around this country.
Jimmy Tully will be missed particularly by the people of Meath. He will be missed by his colleagues in the trade union movement and the rural workers union, which he successfully led for so long and which is now an integral part of SIPTU, the largest union in the country. He will be missed by his family, by his sons, daughters and grandchildren, to whom he was a tower of strength all his time as a working politician. He will be missed very much by me because out of our clash at the beginning of my political career he became a confidante, a friend and someone in whom I placed a great deal of trust and from whom I received much advice.
