THERE was a time when Labour Party representatives were available to one and all. They prided themselves on listening to the common man. Even the humblest citizen was not turned away. But this is no more. Dame Edna, as we know her, has seen to that.
Eithne Fitzgerald is not one of our more sensitive political operators. Her limited experience causes her to put her foot in it from time to time. Her organisation of the Labour Party Finance Bill lunch is no exception.
She includes in her letter of invitation a gloriously condescending sentence which reads: "The occasion provides a rare opportunity to gain access to the Minister in a semi formal environment."
The location is the Sylvan Suite, no less, of Jurys hotel in Dublin and the cost at £100 per plate is cheap at the price if you want some advance titbits on what will be in the Finance Bill.
Ruairi Quinn, who apparently approved the text of the letter in advance, was cute enough to stand up and apologise for the use of official government notepaper as soon as the matter was raised, in the vain hope he would defuse it.
Eithne came in a few hours later and apologised to the same effect, before she ran out of the House as fast as a frightened vixen before a pack of hounds.
What does not seem to occur her or to Ruairi as wrong is the fact that you can only discuss your concerns about the Finance Bill with the Minister for Finance if you pay £100 to do so. Ruairi has refused to meet all the various interest groups who have views to express and has referred them to a Dail committee, which is in any event controlled by the Minister with a Government majority and therefore has only limited say.
This is called a consultation process of openness and transparency. All Drapier can say is that John Bruton's famous pane of glass is getting more frosted by the day.
Drapier has a helpful word of advice for Jurys management on the 28th. Cancel the roast beef and Yorkshire pud for 200 and serve a pot of coffee and sandwiches for three, because the likely attendance at the lunch will be Ruairi Quinn, Eithne Fitzgerald and Greg Sparks. There possibly will be more photographers and reporters outside the door of the luxury Sylvan Suite than there will be well heeled lunchers inside.
Drapier doubts if this particular function will do much for Jurys turnover or profits in 1996.
Fianna Fail members are particularly chuffed at Eithne's faux pas. They consider that she rammed her famous Ethics in Public Office Bill down their throats and lectured them for months on end in a moralising and highly self righteous fashion. Drapier's old friend, Ger Connolly, told them they could be creating a lot of problems for themselves as well as others, how right he was, they claim. Not much ethics in the Sylvan Suite, they mutter. These Bills are only for lesser mortals. The Labour Party feels it is exempt.
"WHAT is the real story about Urlingford?" is the question everyone is asking this week. Something very strange obviously went on. Nora Owen is considerably agitated. Liz O'Donnell and John O'Donoghue asked some reasonable questions, but got no information except to be told that it was the biggest drug seizure in the State's history. Everyone is wondering why all the mystery.
Whenever something is handled like this, suspicions are raised. If it is pursued, Nora has only herself to blame.
It looks to Drapier as it if will be pursued, because late on Thursday evening Nora got Phil Hogan to raise it in a contrived way on an adjournment debate. She described the matter as an "operational decision" of the Garda, not involving politicians. A few minutes after the debate she was running around in a panic to reporters trying to put a different spin on what she had said. It looks like a very big own goal by Nora.
What Dick Spring christened the "proximity talks" got going at last on Monday. Or then again did they? What happened on Monday was a bit of a shambles, with most of those invited not turning up and those who were not invited - Sinn Fein - getting most of the publicity. They squeezed the last drop out of their non invitation. The recent statements of the IRA and Gerry Adams are causing shivers of apprehension. Even the optimists around Leinster House are not forecasting an early resumption of the ceasefire.
The talks are little more than going through the motions and the two governments are going to have to decide what to do about an election after next Wednesday. Nobody wants to contemplate the possibility of another 25 years of war, which Gerry Adams was talking about during the week, but the democrats are making heavy weather of any sort of progress.
DRAPIER found Tuesday's Prime Time programme on the beef industry quite entertaining. Larry has come out fighting after some years of silence and Ivan Yates seems to be finding the going rougher than he expected. If someone senior from Fine Gael approached Goodman for money in August 1994, they were pretty foolish, as that was the month between the publication of the beef tribunal report and the debate in the Dail. That particular fund raiser must not read the papers. Perhaps Fine Gael will spend a few of their hard won shillings on a crash course in tact for him and a few others.
Fine Gael, on its ard fheis weekend, will not be best pleased by Michael Noonan's tactless invitation on Department of Health notepaper to doctors and others to come to a Fine Gael dinner in Limerick, at £100 a head once again. Michael's timing could not have been worse. His mistake is a godsend for Labour, whose members do not try very hard to conceal their views of Fine Gael. Fundraising is a tricky operation.