Ministers love a good photo opportunity.
Give them an eye-catching prop to hold as well and they’re thrilled.
But senior politicians must also exercise vigilance, for they are very vulnerable on these occasions. The mere thought of having their picture taken can trigger the temporary loss of their innate sense of cunning and caution.
Minister of State at the Department of Transport Seán Canney was doing a good thing on Thursday morning when he added the gravitas of junior office to the launch of An Garda Síochána’s annual St Brigid’s bank holiday road safety campaign. Seán joined Assistant Commissioner Catharina Gunne and Road Safety Authority chief executive Sam Waide for a photocall outside the department.
We have boundless admiration for the person who told the Minister what he was required to do for the photographers. How, even, to say it?
“Eh, Minister, great news. We have commissioned a large cardboard cut-out of a mobile phone specially for you with the word ‘Death’ written in huge letters on the screen. It really jumps out at you.
“Underneath it says ‘Incoming Call’, but in smaller letters.
“You just have to hold it up for the cameras and look normal. It’ll be great.”
So Minister Canney duly held up his deathly prop with the Top Cop and the chief executive posing beside him.
The result looks like a promo for a new detective series: “JMI, Canney: Death Calling.”
Junior Minister Indignity (JMI) has always been with us as they have to try harder than their senior Cabinet colleagues to get a look-in.
Seán’s photo was a cause of much mirth. Some wondered if “Death” was actually a nickname he uses for somebody in his contact list.
“I know of a TD who has one journalist saved in his phone as ‘Indo Bad’,” remarked one Leinster House hack in support of this theory.
Quirky pictures have a way of haunting politicians, which is why their minders tend to do a visual sweep of venues on arrival to make sure they don’t stand beside an embarrassing word or walk past an awkward image.
We fondly remember when Bertie Ahern was taoiseach and the Planning Tribunal was causing maximum embarrassment for Fianna Fáil and the highly entertaining cat and mouse game between his handlers and photographers while he toured the Young Scientists’ Exhibition perilously close to a large sign that said “Fiddle”.
Hopefully, the junior minister for transport’s “Death” photo will not come back to haunt him.
And if it persuades even one thoughtless road user to ignore their phone while driving, it will be worth it.
Global ministerial airlift to deliver shamrock in shifts
Oh, the relief.
Rest easy, everyone.
We will not be left rudderless or exposed to domestic unrest and foreign interference when our betters leave these shores for the global St Patrick’s week festivities in March.
When the Government released details this week of this year’s much-anticipated ministerial airlift across the planet, we were taken aback and extremely worried to learn that every member of the Cabinet will have to serve the country abroad when the time comes to take the shamrock on its annual world tour.
All leave has been cancelled.
This news sparked alarmed reports in the media that there would be no Minister left behind to mind the shop and fill the crucial role of “designated survivor”.
Should anarchy break out at home or in the event of all the brave men and women away on political service failing to return or if the Republic of Ireland’s team training for the World Cup qualifier doesn’t go to plan, there will be no leader available to restore calm and keep the country from falling apart.
Not even a super junior minister. Not even a humble junior minister. Not even an Attorney General (although none of them would be able to cope if Independent Ireland decided to launch a coup).
However, following inquiries at the highest level, we can confirm there will always be a comforting Government presence to keep national spirits high during this symbolic period.
“The trips are being staggered,” a Coalition insider confirmed yesterday. “Ministers will be in Ireland to keep Government rolling at all times.”
Thank God for that.
We can only hope, given the largesse usually afforded to visiting TDs by a grateful diaspora, that the visiting political VIPs won’t end up staggered too.
St Brigid’s Day at Leinster House
One of the victims of the dreadful weather along the east coast this week was the Ceann Comhairle’s St Brigid’s Day celebration planned for Leinster House on Tuesday.
Verona Murphy was due to welcome members of the Irish Women’s Parliamentary Caucus, Oireachtas colleagues and members of Diplomatic Corps to an event “to showcase and celebrate the traditions” associated with our patron saint.
Students from Sacred Heart National School from Newbawn in Verona’s Wexford constituency were going to provide the musical entertainment with a St Brigid’s cross rush-weaving workshop laid on for the politicians and their Excellencies afterwards, if it wasn’t too taxing for them.
Lá Fhéile Bríde is tomorrow, Sunday, February 1st, the first day of spring.
During Agriculture Questions on Thursday, Erin McGreehan, the Fianna Fáil TD for Louth, made sure the Dáil didn’t forget.
Erin is very proud of her county’s association with St Brigid.
“Louth and Proud,” she told the Minister for Agriculture, who is from Kildare.
“For the weekend that’s in it, we will think of our nature and heritage and what our plants and trees mean to us. St Brigid: her tree was the birch. It is about fertility, new life and rebirth.
“If you slap the arse of a cow, you’ll have a fertile cow and a healthy calf. So our trees and nature are entwined with our history and our carbon future. Protecting that history and native Irish flora and fauna is really important. Our farmers know this, they have known this for thousands of years. We need to appreciate it.”
Martin Heydon was ready with his response as he was ready to continue the annual St Brigid’s Day Dáil rivalry between Louth and Kildare.
“As we head into the weekend of Imbolc and the start of spring, St Brigid taught us many great things. She might have been connected with the birch but in Kildare she gave us our county name: Cill Dara, being “the church of the oak”, where she built her first, both male and female, monastery,” said the Minister, staking his county’s claim.
“She was absolutely ahead of her time. As the patron saint of milkmaids and brewers, she had a huge connection to all things agricultural and she would very much approve of the work we are doing to improve the sustainability of our agricultural system.”
Next up was Sinn Féin’s Ruairí Ó Murchú.
“I am delighted the Minister has recognised the huge importance of St Brigid from Faughart, not to get into a contentious issue.”
Louth and Proud.
Dishing out advice with relish
Darina Allen at home in her kitchen. Photograph: Michael Mac Sweeney/Provision
Darina Allen, the renowned chef and cofounder of the Ballymaloe Cookery School, was in Leinster House last week for a committee meeting on the hot school meals programme.
It was set up six years ago by Fine Gael’s Regina Doherty, who is now sampling the culinary delights of Brussels as a first-time MEP. Heather Humphreys further expanded the scheme. During her unsuccessful tilt at the presidency, she cited the programme as one of her proudest achievements.
Now, the members of the Committee on Education and Youth are evaluating the impact of the initiative so far and examining how it can be further expanded and improved.
Darina, a lifelong champion of good Irish food and backbone of the Ballymaloe cookery dynasty, is one of the people they have called upon for advice.
She told the committee she was attending, not just on her own behalf, but on behalf of a “coalition of concerned food professionals, educators, advocates, academics and parents working to improve children’s diets”.
While welcoming the introduction of hot school meals and recognising its huge potential, she emphatically stated that what is being served to schoolchildren today “is not fit for purpose”.
But if politicians are “ambitious” and are willing to adopt a different approach, it could transform public health in Ireland.
“One of the first things could be to take ultra-processed foods out of it. They constitute a very high percentage of what students are getting at the moment. We should at least cut down on them,” she said.
Fine Gael Senator Linda Nelson Murray has a particular interest in the area. She recently launched an online survey into hot school meals and is asking parents and teachers to complete it. The feedback will be used to inform the next phase of the programme.
It’s on the party website.
At the meeting, she was struck by Darina Allen’s primary concern that the current scheme is undermining children’s health.
She had a few questions: “I know you’ve got a company that supplies food …”
“That’s my sister-in-law’s company. They supply Ballymaloe Relish,” said Darina.
Does it supply the hot meals programme?
“Yeah, as far as I know they do the Ballymaloe Relish into the DEIS schools and do the tomato sauce as well for some of the pasta. And they’re insistent that it’s nutrient dense and good for them.”
Linda was glad to hear this. “So I was just checking that, with your own company, or your sister-in-law’s or whatever it is, your family company, you wouldn’t count that as ultra processed food. That’s quite nutritious, what goes in. Made fresh and all that?”
“Yes. They are very careful about that,” stressed Darina.
Last August, Ballymaloe Foods signed a renewed partnership with the Lunch Bag school meal supplier to bring its nutritious Irish-made tomato sauce to schools around the country.
According to Checkout Magazine, Lunch Bag supplies more than 600,000 meals containing Ballymaloe sauce to schoolchildren every month.
That’s good news for the kids.