Permanent scar from Vincent Browne show for Fine Gael TD

Most politicians are happy to escape with just a minor mauling after a studio session with Vincent Browne.

One Fine Gael TD though is permanently scarred as a result of appearing on the late-night current affairs show – and for that, Jim Daly of Cork South West is extremely grateful.

In a welcome case of history repeating itself, Daly’s GP was watching him discuss the Children’s Referendum on Browne’s show when he noticed an unusual looking spot just above his cheekbone.

“Jesus, I don’t like the look of that!” he said.

The Rosscarbery-based doctor knew he was likely to run into the TD at a local function the following night and made it his business to seek him out.

“The doc came up to me and said he wasn’t happy with the look of this little thing on my face,” recalls Daly, who lives in Clonakilty. “He told me to come over to him in the surgery so he could take a proper look at it.”

That was in November and Daly got around to seeing him in December. He was packed off to Cork see a consultant.

“They did a biopsy and I was told ‘yes, it’s cancerous and it has to come off your face’.”

In the weeks coming up to his operation, Daly kept his spirits up and took to calling the spot “my little VinB.”

He was admitted to the Bons Secours at the end of February, surgery was carried out and he spent a week in hospital. The procedure was a complete success and Daly was told he would not require any follow-on treatment. He returned to the Dáil last week.

“I’d had this sort of spot on my face for a while,” says the father of four sons. “It was like a little pimple and I never really thought anything of it.”

Daly reckons he won’t forget the day of the operation either. “It was the same afternoon James Reilly got stuck in the lift. The nurses and doctors were up in arms over the Croke Park agreement and there I was – a government TD – about to go under the knife, and the last thing I saw before they put me under was a doctor on one side of the bed, a nurse on the other and a lot of sharp medical instruments.”

His lucky TV break brings to mind the case of former Fianna Fáil junior minister Conor Lenihan, who had a similar experience in 2007. A hospital consultant in Galway, while watching him on Prime Time , noticed a strange lump on his cheek and got in touch to urge him to have it checked out immediately.