THE TAOISEACH was guest of honour at the recent Good Food Ireland awards.

After a day spent wrestling with possibly the worst budget every put together by an Irish government, he rushed off to deliver his speech.

He was his usual whimsical self: full of funny little anecdotes, effusive about Irish foods and tourism and bringing the diaspora home.

When he finished he got a standing ovation from the 300 or so guests in the ballroom of the Shelbourne Hotel.

At which point he was presented with a very large chocolate Santa made by the chocolatiers at the Chocolate Garden in Carlow.

Obviously, the Taoiseach couldn’t take it back to Leinster House in case young Leo saw it. Minister Varadkar has a very sweet tooth and heaven knows what sort of statements he might have made after experiencing the sugar rush from a giant Santa.

(He overdosed on the Jelly Tots again this week and got into trouble for saying that the budget won’t be all that bad and people will still be able to go off on a holiday.)

So Enda promptly decided he would auction it off for charity and took it upon himself to act as auctioneer. He took the microphone and said he wanted €1,000 for the Santy.

He reached his target in just 50 seconds – Peter Caviston, Glasthule’s renowned fishmonger and restaurateur, got in with the winning bid and the St Vincent de Paul got a few more bob in the run-up to Christmas.