I sometimes think of Leo Varadkar as the Forrest Gump of the gay rights movement in Ireland: an unlikely figure who was always in the right place at just the right time. He waited until it was safe politically to come out and was against gay adoption before that, but then within a few short years he was on the cover of Time magazine as Ireland's first gay taoiseach, a global symbol of modernity.
Leo Varadkar has criticised the garda investigation into his leaking of a medical document and has questioned whether it was "revenge" for his role in the Maurice McCabe affair, which led to the exit of two garda commissioners. The former taoiseach says he still struggles to understand why so much time and money was spent on an "unnecessary investigation" and why no effort was made to speed it up "given my position".
In these three edited extracts from his new autobiography, former taoiseach Leo Varadkar gives the inside story of some of the most dramatic moments of his political career. As the Covid pandemic raged and the public adhered to lockdown restrictions, controversy erupted over a group of politicians enjoying a day out with the Oireachtas Golf Society. Among the political casualties was then EU commissioner, Phil Hogan, with whom Varadkar says he's no longer on speaking terms.
