[citation needed] In the December 1979, Fianna Fáil leadership contest, McCreevy strongly supported the controversial Charles Haughey, who narrowly won the post.

In October 1982, McCreevy launched a motion of no-confidence in the party leader, which evolved into a leadership challenge by Desmond O'Malley.

In an open ballot and supported by only 21 of his 79 colleagues (known as the "Gang of 22"), the motion failed and McCreevy was temporarily expelled from the parliamentary party.

[citation needed] In later years O'Malley was expelled from Fianna Fáil itself and formed the Progressive Democrats (PDs), espousing conservative fiscal policies.

Although considered ideologically close to the PDs, and a personal friend of its erstwhile leader, Mary Harney, McCreevy chose to remain a member of Fianna Fáil, where he would eventually serve in joint FF-PD Governments.

In this role, he is principally remembered for a set of 12 cost-cutting measures, collectively termed the "dirty dozen", which were arguably minor in their direct impact but provided a major political headache for his party in the 1992 general election.

His period coincided with the era of the "Celtic Tiger", which saw the rapid growth of the Irish economy due to social partnership between employers, government and unions; increased female participation in the labour force, decades of tuition-free secondary education; targeting of foreign (primarily U.S.) direct investment; a low corporation tax rate; an English-speaking workforce only five time-zones from New York, and membership of the European Union – which provided payments for infrastructural development, export access to the Single Market and a Eurozone country.

Real GDP growth across the full period of the Celtic Tiger represented by far the highest average of any western European country.

These included special tax incentives targeted at the area covered by the pilot Rural Renewal Scheme, which was later criticised by the Heritage Council for being introduced without a "Baseline Audit" to inform the level and scale of development to be supported through the scheme, not identifying priority areas suitable for development, not providing any strategic protection for designated areas including the corridor of the River Shannon nor promoting the use of sustainable design and building materials in any new build or refurbishment project supported by the scheme.

McCreevy also prompted warnings from the European Commission, who claimed that his £2 billion tax giveaway in 2000 would be inflationary, and harmful to the Irish economy.

[17] Former Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald attributed Ireland's dire economic state in 2009, on a series of "calamitous" government policy errors by the then Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy, who between the years of 2000 and 2003, boosted public spending by 48pc while cutting income tax.

"When McCreevy resigned his Dáil seat on his appointment to the European Commission, his son, Charlie Jnr, declined the opportunity to be the Fianna Fáil candidate in the resulting by-election.

[25] Following his departure from the commission, McCreevy was forced to resign from the board of a new banking firm, NBNK Investments, after an EU ethics committee found a conflict of interest with his work as a European Commissioner in charge of financial regulation.

Schulz slightly misquoted McCreevy, whom he stated had contributed to Ireland's rejection of the Lisbon Treaty with remarks during the referendum campaign that no "sane person" would read the document.