If anyone has a spare set of bagpipes, they might see their way to loaning them for a special event next Saturday. Tony Blair's press secretary Alistair Campbell will be guest speaker at the second Media Ball in the Burlington Hotel and he has let it be known that if pipes are provided he will play them, an interlude that could make or break the evening.
Six hundred tickets at £100 a head have long been sold and there is a huge waiting list for what is turning into the smartest political/ business event of the year. £50,000 was raised for GOAL last year and this day week the committee, drawn from our main news-gathering organisations and chaired by RTE business reporter Geraldine Harney, hopes to top that. The money will go to the Kosovo refugees via GOAL and Cradle, and much is expected to be made from the auction, to be conducted by Mark FitzGerald. The items include a Daewoo Mitiz car from Daewoo Ireland, a Louis le Broquy painting donated by the artist, four bottles of vintage wine from a mystery donor, premier class tickets to New York with a suite in Fitzpatrick's, and a helicopter trip to the Slane concert with Robbie Williams. The main sponsors are IAWS and Eircell.
Campbell, who will stay with ambassador Ivor Roberts at Glencairn to avoid, it is said, breaching the now all pervasive ethics code, is an interesting choice of speaker. He is not known to pull his punches and in the best tradition of government press secretaries has had several run-ins with the UK media.
Margaret Thatcher's press secretary, the often cantankerous Bernard Ingham had the following advice for new politicians: "Journalists are never off duty. So never ever trust them until they are dead . . . for three days." So what will Blair's man have to say to the Irish press corps on their night off?