Only in Ireland
Sunday, July 13, 2014 at 15:43 I love my regular visits to Ireland.
When I was in Dublin ten days ago I couldn't help notice that the main story was not the forthcoming Government reshuffle – finally announced on Friday – but an extraordinary kerfuffle about a series of concerts in the city.
The story, much abbreviated, is as follows:
American country and western singer Garth Brooks had been booked to perform three concerts at Croke Park, home of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA).
Demand for tickets was so high an additional two concerts were added, making five in all.
Allegedly this exceeded the agreed number of events Croke Park is allowed to stage each year and a very small minority of local residents, led (again, allegedly) by a long-standing political activist who is not a local resident but has a grievance with the GAA, complained.
Consequently Dublin City Council insisted that only three concerts could go ahead and Brooks responded by saying "All or nothing".
Concert-goers, some of whom were travelling long distances from abroad, were up in arms. So too were local businesses including Dublin hotels which were expecting hundreds of thousands of extra visitors.
It's a total mess and utterly compelling. I urge you to read about it. The Irish media is awash with reports but here are a few:
Croke Park residents threaten legal action if Garth Brooks concerts are licensed by council (Irish Times)
Brooks issues ultimatum: 'Five shows or none at all' (RTE News)
Noisy neigbours: Battle for Garth Brooks rumbles on (Irish Independent)
Blame report for Garth Brooks fiasco will be extensive (Irish Times)
Mystery grows as man who tried to stop Garth Brooks gigs claims: I was given £12,000 to fund court case (Belfast Telegraph)
Even our man in Cork, John Mallon, has something to say: Common sense and the Irish.
Meanwhile the long-awaited Irish Government reshuffle finally took place on Friday.
This was of special interest to Forest because we wanted to know the fate of health minister James Reilly whose personal mission to rid the country of tobacco had become all-consuming.
Not only does he want to ban smoking in cars with children and introduce plain packaging, longer-term he wants Ireland to be "smoke free" by 2025.
Being anti-tobacco however was not enough to save his reputation. Generally Reilly was perceived as a bumbling, incompetent minister who presided over a health service whose budget was wildly out of control.
In fact it has been assumed for months that his days as health minister were numbered and the only thing keeping him in office was his friendship with Irish prime minister Enda Kenny and his position as deputy leader of Fine Gael.
Lo and behold, and to save his old friend losing face, Kenny has come up with one of the great political fudges.
The Taoiseach has appointed a new Minister for Health (Leo Varadkar) and has given Reilly the job of Children and Public Health Minister, "with an emphasis on tobacco and obesity".
How Varadkar will react to Reilly calling the shots on tobacco and obesity remains to be seen. All we know is, Reilly will take his anti-smoking crusade to the Children portfolio.
The most unusual appointment however involves Simon Coveney, Ireland's Minister for Agriculture, because in addition to his existing job, Coveney has been handed the defence portfolio.
I'll hand you over to John Mallon for his comment:
"Just how Coveney is to reconcile those two is the subject of conjecture. Perhaps he'll opt to arm the farmers by putting gun turrets on tractors? If we are invaded then Simon could issue rotten vegetables to throw at the enemy.
"In this new set-up he also controls both our gun boats and our trawlers under one umbrella meaning he must help and encourage fishermen while doing everything he can to stop them."
Me? I couldn't possibly comment.
Reader Comments (1)
“How Varadkar will react to Reilly calling the shots on tobacco and obesity remains to be seen”
Rather depends on how anti-smoking the new chap is, I guess. Do you have any inklings, Simon? If he’s a sensible sort and he’s got a big job on his hands (which it sounds like he has), he’ll ditch huge swathes of anti-this and anti-that one-eyed preoccupation groups (including the ever-demanding anti-smoking bunch) and concentrate on getting the health service back to doing the job of treating sick people; if he’s not then he’ll probably just give Reilly a free rein to keep batting on and on and on about smoking and obesity and all his other favourite hobby-horses and will just quietly do as he is told …
“Me? I couldn't possibly comment”
Interesting final comment. Did you by any chance watch yesterday’s re-run of “House of Cards,” as I did, from start to finish? Brilliant!