SPEAKERS FROM TCD UCD, UL, UCG and the Solicitors' Apprentices Debating Society of Ireland - will compete in this year's final of the Irish Times Debate, which takes place on Tuesday, February 11th, in TCD, at 7.30 p.m. The motion for the final is "That this House would support public funding of political parties".
The chairman for the debate will be Bertie Ahern, leader of Fianna Fail, who can presumably be relied upon not to make any cracks at the expense of the Government in his chairman's address to the house.
The Irish Times Debate is the oldest inter varsity debating competition in Ireland. Previous winners include TV personalities Henry Kelly and Derek Davis, Live and Crimeline host Marian Finucane, journalist Eamonn McCann and a veritable dock full of barristers including Adrian Hardiman and the Attorney General, Dermot Gleeson.
In keeping with this not entirely honourable tradition, the team winners of last year's final were Paul McDermott and Helen Boyle of the King's Inns. Sadly, the Inns will not be represented in the final this year.
The hosts for this year's debate, the TCD Historical Society, will be doing their best to maximise the home advantage for their representatives, Adrian Langan and Jackie O'Hara. In the individual competition, TCD is also represented by Andrew Beck of the Law Society.
TCD's perrenial betes noirs, UCD Literary & Historical Society, are represented by Gillian Sinnott and Bairbre O'Neill, who won their place in a semi final on their home ground of UCD's arts block. They are unlikely to find the crowd in TCD's Edmund Burke Theatre quite so accommodating.
The UCD Law Society is represented by putative UCD SU presidential candidate Ian Walsh and team mate Rossa Fanning. Finally, congratulations to UL's Debating Union, which has a team in the final for the first time in its short history. UL students' union president Seamus Doran and team mate Padraic O'Halloran will be attempting to pull off a memorable coup by stealing the Demosthenes Trophy from under the noses of the old reliables.
UCG's Literary & Debating Society have two individual speakers in the final: Mary Cosgrove, who came through in a difficult, closely fought semi final in Waterford RTC, and Fergal Crehan. The last place in the final is taken by Matthew McCabe of Solicitors' Apprentices Debating Society of Ireland, keeping the legal flag flying along with the representatives of the TCD and UCD law societies.
The team and individual winners of this year's final will participate in a debating tour of US colleges, jointly sponsored by The Irish Times and Aer Lingus. This has been a regular part of the Irish Times Debate since 1980, and Irish teams have acquitted themselves admirably throughout.
In fact, it is difficult to remember when the US debaters last managed to score a victory over their Irish counterparts. As former winner Diarmuid Conway once remarked, Ellis Island now has a new sign: "No Drugs, No Dogs, No Irish Debaters".
