Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

——was head of the EU research institute and had 2,500 people under him. He had already been responsible for the Marie Curie EU fellowship programme for some years in the 1990s.

He set up BioResearch Ireland before that. For all these reasons, he was an eminent person for the post. However, a controversy about a qualification which Mr. McSweeney did not require has damaged the organisation.

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