Seanad’s golf outing causes controversy; Cassidy’s good cheer; Green candidate’s fishy bid to win election; Coughlan takes a swipe at old SF rival; Tuffy is Martin Sheen’s Irish ‘Ma’ and Healy-Raes are target of poster smear campaign
Seanad gets teed off
It was blowing a gale in Portmarnock Golf Club when Seanad leader Donie Cassidy arrived on the tee with Dr Martin McAleese, who was part of a fourball with Castlepollard’s answer to Tiger Woods.
The starts were staggered on Tuesday for the biggest fixture in the Oireachtas Golf Society calendar – captain’s day. Some went off early in the morning, while others had afternoon starts. Donie, who is secretary of the society, teed off in the middle group and began his round just before midday.
Given the conditions on the challenging links course, it would have taken Senator Cassidy and his group well over four hours to get in 18 holes.
“It was so wild out there, I couldn’t get my balls to stay down. The wind kept catching them and whipping them up,” one of the participants told us afterwards, insisting on strict anonymity. Understandable, given the statement above.
Despite the conditions, it was an enjoyable outing for the 80 or so Oireachtas members, former members and their guests, who rounded off the day with a nosh-up in the dining room in Leinster House. It was attended by President Mary McAleese, who joined her husband Martin after he had braved the hair-raising conditions in Portmarnock with Donie.
Both men were well covered up against the elements. Donie battened down the hatches by wearing a snug and particularly fetching peaked golf cap.
Prizes were awarded after the dinner, with former Fianna Fáil TD Hugh Byrne the overall winner.
But the memory of the occasion was sullied for Donie when newspaper reports appeared, suggesting the Seanad didn’t sit on Tuesday because it clashed with their leader’s big day on the golf course.
Opposition Senators were outraged and appalled, appalled and outraged, when they discovered why they had no sitting Tuesday. Nobody had cared to inquire, it seemed, before the newspapers got involved.
But then they heard about the golf. This was too much.
“I was outside those gates at 7.25am yesterday, waiting for them to open and I got home last night at 10pm,” said Senator Joe O’Toole, indicating he was far to busy to be out in Portmarnock swinging a club.
Does the man have no home to go to? Meanwhile, Donie’s Fianna Fáil colleagues mounted a rather wishy-washy defence of their leader, apart from Marc MacSharry, who preferred the incoherent approach.
“I hope that in respect of other valuable debates and innovations that are conceptualised in this house, the media will cover them in the appropriate fashion, and not just in a demeaning way, such as how it was suggested we did not sit yesterday because of golf.
“I am not a golfer and I am available to sit in this house 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I speak for 99 per cent of colleagues on both sides of the house when I say that.”
(In October 2008, they endured an all-night sitting, and have been clapping themselves on the back ever since.)
"It is disingenuous in the extreme for a news media organisation such as INMto perpetrate such a criminal suggestion upon instruments of the State, which members on both sides are. I am more than prepared to sit any day of the week, particularly Fridays, Saturdays and during the night, but it was far from the front page I saw on those occasions.
“From Fine Gael, Independents and this side, I have heard suggestions and innovations from all disciplines considered by the Houses of the Oireachtas but I have never seen this on the front page.”
The instrument known as Donie explained that the sitting was not abandoned due to a game of golf. “To my knowledge, the event that took place yesterday was arranged last January,” said secretary Cassidy, adding he and three Opposition colleagues played to “honour former members.” Some of them played at half seven in the morning.
“One day a year we get together to appreciate what former colleagues did as former members of both Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann. I hope I have made myself clear in this regard.” David Norris and his fellow instruments told him he was talking rubbish.
They never got a proper explanation as to why the upper chamber didn’t sit. By the way, if they are all instruments, do they constitute a chamber orchestra when they occasionally manage to sit?
Pioneering pub ventures
Still on Donie, who recently got two big awards within days of each other. He received his golden Pioneer pin recently at a special ceremony in Westmeath. It was a big honour for the teetotal Senator, marking 50 years of abstinence from alcohol.
A week earlier, he was part of the consortium given the nod to run the eight bars in Dublin airport. The pubs in the departure area stay open all day and for most of the night.
At least Senator Cassidy knows he will never become his own best customer.
Fishy campaigning
It’s one thing to chase votes onshore, but another to pursue them at sea. Former Galway mayor and Green Party councillor Niall Ó Brolcháin issued a press release earlier this week expressing his “delight” at the antics of Salthill’s visiting dolphin.
In an attempt to exploit the Fungie Factor, Councillor O’Brolchain breathlessly recalled: “Coming back from the final meeting of Galway City Council prior to the election when I saw a number of people gathered on the promenade, looking out to sea. I stopped and saw the Salthill dolphin. This was a great tonic after yet another fractious council meeting.” Fascinating.
“I went home to pick up my wife and family, we watched from the small pier in front of the Waterfront Hotel as the dolphin performed a series of back flips right in front of us,” he said. He and his wife have christened the marine mammal “Sophie” and believe she is taking up permanent residence, heralding a good summer.
Judging by some of the statements emanating from the Green Party in these turbulent political times, Sophie isn’t the only flipper around at the moment.
Finance spokesman, Senator Dan Boyle, seems particularly conflicted, saying last night that the time has come to rethink the programme for government.
This might have something to do with the fact that he’s running in the European elections and trying to distance himself from his senior Coalition partners in Fianna Fáil.
Some disaffected Greens have remarked that Sophie may have come south to Galway from Broadhaven Bay in north Mayo – an established spot for whales and dolphins. “That back flip was to remind the party of its own back flip on the Corrib gas project,” one observer sniffed.
Before entering government, the Greens supported a review of the entire development concept for the controversial gas project, as articulated by former leader Trevor Sargent.
Meanwhile, others are worried that the Volvo ocean race fleet and attendant throng will frighten Sophie away for good.
But she’s made of sterner stuff. It is understood the popular dolphin turned down numerous requests from FF to run for them in the North est constituency.
Coughlan’s college rival
A cryptic comment from Tánaiste Mary Coughlan on Thursday, who looked very smart in her red and white striped jacket, like she had come straight from a practice session with a barbershop quartet.
“As the Ceann Comhairle knows, there have been two requests to his office and it is for him to decide on time availability for adjournment debates and private notice questions. I note Deputy O’Snodaigh has not changed since the time we were in college.” Sinn Féin’s Aengus O’Snodaigh told us he was surprised by the Tánaiste’s long memory.
“She was in the Fianna Fáil cumann with Conor Lenihan when we were in UCD in the 1980s. I was an arts student and in Sinn Féin and we used to have some right barneys. It’s strange, where we all ended up.” Still fighting, after all these years.
Did they socialise together? “It was very rare that I drank pints up in UCD – I couldn’t afford to.”
Sheen’s Labour ‘Ma’
There was a strange moment on the Late Late Showlast week, when Pat Kenny told his guest, actor Martin Sheen, that the woman who played his mother in the movie Dawas in the audience. It was none other than Labour TD for Dublin Mid-West, Joanna Tuffy. Whereupon the lovely Martin bounded up the steps to where Joanna was sitting and embraced her like a long lost friend.
But hold on a minute. That movie was made in 1988, and deputy Tuffy is a mere spring chicken compared to President Bartlet from the West Wing.
All week, the TD was fielding inquiries from colleagues and constituents wondering how the hell could she have played the actor’s mammy? On the campaign trail, it was all people wanted to talk to her about.
"I was a student in Trinity at the time and I used to do a bit of acting at the time. I was an extra on the movie and they needed somebody to play Hugh Leonard's mother before she married. It was only a very small part, but I got paid 80 pounds, which was a lot at the time." Joanna also played a maid in the series the Irish RM .
“I had really long hair back then and sort of fitted the part in period dramas.” She said she was very surprised when Sheen ran up to greet her. “I was really chuffed. He’s such a nice man. I haven’t stopped smiling all week.”
Dirty poster tricks
Thievery of election posters is rampant around the country. Reports are coming in from all parties of skullduggery on the hustings, with posters disappearing at a terrific rate, only to be replaced by rival versions.
However, things have gone very bad in Kerry, where the Healy-Rae clan are featuring on glossy leaflets which have been left around Killarney and, in some cases, posted to people.
The production shows the family patriach, Jackie Healy-Rae TD and his two sons, councillors Michael and Danny. The anonymous leaflet dropper has depicted the trio in full musketeer costume, right up to the big plumed hats.
“The Three Musketeers – Millionaires” is the message, followed by all sorts of nasty and unsubstantiated allegations about the highly successful politicians.
There is much speculation in the Kingdom over who might be behind the leaflets, which appear to be expensive efforts.
However, it is expected that Michael and Danny will romp home in their electoral areas of Killorglin and Killarney. But they’ll be wearing their ordinary caps if, and when they do.
Phelan on German TV
John Paul Phelan, Fine Gael’s European election candidate in Ireland East, will be trailed on the campaign trail next week by a film crew from Bavaria.
Phelan (30) is delighted with himself. “The crew is from the German public television station BR. It’s a national station, the Bavarian channel within the national network of ARD, and I’m the only European candidate they have chosen to film.”
They start on Monday and will be following him for five days. They are particularly interested in his visits to marts around the constituency.
John Paul will feature in a half-hour political programme which goes out on June 2nd, as part of a series of three. The other two programmes feature a community volunteer in Poland and an 18 year-old first-time voter in Bavaria.
“Following John as a young politician trying to retain the second seat for his party seems to be a good way to learn more about people in the heart of Ireland and the atmosphere before the election. Are their differences between Ireland, Poland and Germany? We will see,” said producer, Robert Scharold. He’ll overjoyed with the footage of the fight he’ll get should Phelan bump into his running mate, Mairéad McGuinness.
Bertie’s priestly advice
“Take life in instalments, this one day now. At least let this be a good day. Be always beginning. Let the past go. Now let me do whatever I have the power to do.” These are the words of Fr John Sullivan, SJ, as quoted by Bertie Ahern in his final address to the Dáil a year ago. Unfortunately for The Bert, his premature exit was brought about by the Mahon tribunal, which discovered that he took more than life in instalments.
On Tuesday night, the former taoiseach launched a biography of Fr Sullivan at a reception in St Francis Xavier’s Church in Dublin’s Gardiner Street. Bertie attends Mass regularly in the church, which houses a shrine to the cleric, who died in 1933.
Where Two Traditions Meet is written by historian Fr Tom Morrissey. His subject was a well-to-do barrister from a wealthy Protestant family, a socialite who was once known as the best dressed man in Dublin.
In 1896, John Sullivan changed his religion and profession and became “a shabby clothed philanthropist, priest and teacher.” He spent the rest of his life in Clongowes Wood College in Kildare. But back to that day in the Dáil last April, when Bertie quoted the words of the priest, he did stop short when delivering Fr Sullivan’s practical advice for life.
He left out the final two lines: “The saints were always beginning. This is how they became saints.”
An Offaly topical play
If the Taoiseach needs a break from the daily grind, he could do worse than head down from Leinster House to the Players Theatre in Trinity College to see the revival of Marina Carr's Ariel, directed by Jim Ivers.
Ariel was first performed in Dublin at The Abbey in 2002. “The play’s theme surrounds the epic conflict between those who exercise authority and those who seek to usurp it for their own ends. It is focused on the pursuit of power by Fermoy Fitzgerald, a Co Offaly politician, the effect it has on his family and the terrifying price he is prepared to pay for it.”
Then again, maybe not.