DO we really need a president? The question popped into my head listening to Fergus Finlay declaring his interest in running for the Áras last Thursday.

Ever articulate, Finlay spoke eloquently about how the presidential election represented a real opportunity for people to sort out what kind of leadership they want to see in the years ahead. It would give a mandate to the person who best reflects the possibilities for Ireland. A president, he added, who personifies that spirit of decency and community and "fight-back" that exists in Ireland could make a profound difference.

Fine words, no doubt. But how grounded in reality are they? As everybody knows the presidency role is largely ceremonial, devoid of any power or influence. That is very deliberately set out in the constitution.

So how can a president provide the kind of leadership that Finlay talks about? He or she can certainly talk the talk about the kind of Ireland that they want to see – God knows Mary Robinson and Mary McAleese have both done that. But they are constitutionally barred from walking the walk in bringing about that kind of Ireland.

It can be (and certainly has been) argued that Mary Robinson made a profound difference as President. But notwithstanding Robinson's obvious abilities, that was largely a result of timing. Ireland was changing dramatically and Robinson captured that sense of modernity and a new order. It was a unique set of circumstances.

It's true that the current circumstances we find ourselves in are also unique. The country is in a battle for survival to maintain our economic sovereignty. But that is a matter for the government and the Dáil. All the key decisions – or at least all the key decisions this state has control over – lie with them. Not only can the president not get involved in those decisions, but he or she cannot be seen to even have a view on those decisions.

Finlay is unquestionably correct in his assertion that people are feeling let down and betrayed by politicians, big business, the banks, the professions, the church etc. But it's very difficult to see what the president can do about that. Lighting a candle in the window of the Áras isn't going to do much to keep the IMF from the door, make the Anglo Irish nightmare go away or pay the mortgage.

As Barack Obama is discovering, rhetoric is not what is required in the current crisis but action and that's not within the remit of the occupier of Áras an Uachtaráin.

All of which brings us back to the opening question as to whether we need a president. The president acts as a type of guardian of the constitution and can play a key role, for example, in referring legislation to the courts or dissolving the Dáil. All of those functions could probably be carried out by a special commission or a council of state. But deciding who would sit on such a body would be difficult – they would have to be seen to be non-party affiliated.

And what such a commission or a council of state couldn't do, however, is to play the kind of key ambassadorial role for the country – for example what Mary McAleese was doing in Russia last week. It wouldn't make sense for the Taoiseach of the country to be filling up his diary with such engagements.

And there is also the very practical point that any removal of the office of the president would require a constitutional referendum. Given that this is hardly the most pressing issue facing the country, the merits of holding such a referendum would be highly questionable and, put simply, it's not going to happen.

But while we're stuck with the presidency, for better or worse, it doesn't mean we need to get hung up on having a fiercely contested election every seven years. Did it make any practical difference whatsoever to the lives of the people of Ireland that Mary McAleese was returned as president in 2004 without a contest?

Paddy Hillery never went through a presidential election but when we strip away the hype and the media coverage that has surrounded his successors, was he any less effective in performing the role of president as envisaged in the constitution?

The only election that would really matter to people's lives in 2011 would be a general election. And the reality is if that comes to pass, all the oratory about the need for the presidency to define the values, ideas, vision, direction etc of the nation is likely to be set to one side.

A new Fine Gael-Labour government will have so much on its plate that the last thing it will want is a presidential election, particularly one involving competing FG and Labour candidates.

The new Fianna Fáil leader, facing into a massive rebuilding job, isn't going to be enamoured by the prospect of such an election either.

In that scenario, the emergence of an agreed candidate is a distinct possibility. If that happens, the world won't stop turning on its axis. Ireland's democracy won't be undermined. It won't make a blind bit of difference to the future values or direction of the country. Of course, there will be the huge huffing and puffing to the contrary, but right now, we have bigger, much much bigger, things to be worrying about than the presidency.

scoleman@tribune.ie