James McDaid is certainly in love with his job. He warmly appreciates being the first Irish minister to represent sport at the Cabinet table, first because he enjoys all sport and like the overwhelming majority of people in this country (really?) he gets caught up in the thrills, the excitement, the tension and the sheer magic of big sporting events. Second, he has the good fortune, in making the case for sport, to have a Taoiseach like Bertie Ahern who is "into" sport in a big way and a Minister for Finance like Charlie McCreevy whose two spiritual homes are the Gaelic Park at Newbridge and the Curragh.
Wonderful as it is, however, there are headaches. Neither Bertie nor Charlie would give him enough money to do all he would like.
Speaking at the launch of Hoping for Heroes, photographs from Irish sport, McDaid said he intended bringing the picture of the crowd on the Hill at this year's hurling final to Cabinet whenever the sports estimates were on the agenda. "I'll be able to point out that these happy citizens don't seem to have a care in the world about things like potholes, traffic congestion or headage payments. The moral of my argument will be obvious. The more I get for sport, the more happiness I'll be able to spread."