SMOKES & DAGGERS
A mischievous mix of political asides with JOHN DRENNAN
LEGACY-HUNTING Taoiseach Leo Varadkar was feeling the heat this week, and exchanges on the topic of referendums with Mattie McGrath won’t have helped.
McGrath argued in the Dáil that ‘the Government will get a fine kick in the you-know-where next week on Friday or Saturday and the smirk will be on the other side of his face’.
Mr Varadkar countered with a swipe at Mattie’s ‘latest conspiracy theory {including} the Referendum Commission, which does not even exist any more’.
PRESSURE is growing on Darragh O’Brien to set a date for council elections, with the issue raised in the Seanad by Victor Boyhan.
Responding, minister Pippa Hackett, right, would only commit to a decision being made in April.
One observer noted: ‘It’s terrible, the poor councillors are like children waiting for Christmas who haven’t been told December 25 is the actual date.’
MALE TDs are apparently up the walls over the number of female politician portraits being hung in Leinster House – as decided by the Dáil Portraits Committee.
One female TD – whose party we can’t mention for fear of identifying a source, so scarce are our female TDs – said: ‘Given that we are 100th in the world when it comes to female politicians, maybe they might allow us to have a few portraits on the walls’.
Hang in there!
AFTER Green Minister Malcolm Noonan declared an interest in schools becoming polling stations, he admitted: ‘My children lobbied me this week to try to have their school included.’ But he had to concede his limitations. ‘Unfortunately, it is not.’