We begin our scene at the Government tourism brainstorm. It’s a tasteful, if plain, boardroom, plastered with inspirational quote posters – Move fast and break things; Be the change you want to see; Keep calm and give subsidies to developers.
Emer Higgins has unfortunately not made it. Following her ascension last week to Ireland’s most lauded internet sketch comedian, she is currently in negotiations with Vicar Street for a run that may even surpass Joanne McNally’s record-breaking stint. The Emer Express will be a sell-out.
Paschal Donohoe has a money gun loaded with €500 notes. With just 2½ of these notes, you can rent a Yaris for an entire week. Getting into the swing of things, he’s quoting from the seminal Jennifer Lopez film, Hustlers: “This city, this whole country, is a strip club. You’ve got people tossing the money, and people doing the dance.”
Simon Coveney is not here, alas. He is off being a tourist elsewhere, doing Very Very Very Important Business. Do we honestly expect our glorious Minister to be #WFH? What do you think he is? Some kind of peasant? He has yachts to co-own, try it some time. Of course, his extensive travel is made possible because, unlike many of us, the Minister has a valid passport.
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Neale Richmond is here. Usually his time is spent tweeting evidence of Ireland’s soaring economic successes – take a look around, people, we are doing great! – a masterclass in political communication that could be surpassed only if he pulled the Oireachtas printer out on to Kildare Street and printed his tweets in bulk for passing millennials to origami into gaffs.
Eamon Ryan is present. He brought some recyclable Lego to demonstrate how beneficial even more data centres will be for Ireland’s climate goals under his watch, and a collection of children’s windmills to illustrate the wind farms being bought up by Facebook and Amazon which definitely, definitely, have Ireland’s energy interests at heart. He looks suspiciously sooty, perhaps he just came from Moneypoint where in 2019, 20,000 tonnes of coal were burned to generate electricity, and in 2021, with the Green Party in government, that rose to one million tonnes burned. Dream big! Smash those targets!
Leo Varadkar is here. I mean, it’s a surprise that he’s still in a job considering the aul Garda investigation. I once got fired from a restaurant for accidentally sending a load of orders to the kitchen that were the chicken dish from the a la carte menu, and not the chicken special that was on that evening. Should have leaked the secret sauce and kept the gig.
Stephen Donnelly is here with some innovative pitches; a hyperloop from Holles Street to St Vincent’s, selling Monaghan to Lucasfilm to turn it into a movie theme park: Attack of the Clones. Didn’t it do wonders for Kerry? He has brought his own portable trampoline to demonstrate his dynamic leadership energy. Everyone moves away from Stephen.
There’s a smattering of touts cluttering the corridor, festooned with hats, scarves and headbands. Curiously, they don’t want cash for tickets. How can we expect politicians to appreciate Irish culture if they’re not getting blags to All-Ireland finals, concerts and festivals? And remember, that’s not lobbying, that’s just being sound.
The first blue-sky-thinking exercise begins. Heather Humphreys pitches. Lads, would you prefer a fortnight in a hostel in Temple Bar or two weeks all-inclusive in St Lucia? Remember, they cost the same. That’s a toughie. Darragh O’Brien has an idea: Hovels For All. Recreate the Irish famine experience by lying in a ditch at the side of the road. €305 pp (ex-VAT). There are no bad ideas, let’s keep going.
Beep beep! It’s Norma Foley’s Magic School Bus Tour! Hop on, hop off, and tour the hotels of Dublin city which replaced everything else. See this hotel, just €453 a night! Check out this short-stay apartment, a snip at €615. Wow. So many attractions, so little time (because you spent an hour waiting for a taxi from the airport). Catherine Martin floats an idea: what about BTI? Basic Tourist Income helping visitors afford the impossibly high prices of, well, everything? There’s something in that, says Simon Harris, who is in charge of the social media content for the day.
Micheál Martin is having none of it. Sure why do people need to be going anywhere? If everything just stayed closed we wouldn’t have a staffing crisis in every bed and breakfast, restaurant, hotel, cafe and pub in the land. Is there anything to be said for another lockdown? The Taoiseach is fully behind Fáilte Ireland’s plan to get pensioners working in hospitality. Sure he’ll be needing a new job soon himself, and if he can pick up a few shifts in the Radisson or do the door at Coppers two nights a week, well, ní neart go cur le chéile.
So please, if you’re visiting Ireland this summer, remember our main attraction is the price of everything and the value of nothing. Never mind yizzer Tokyos or Parises, Londons or New Yorks. For top tier prices: Ireland, you can’t bate it.