TENTS, GALES and heavy rain don’t tend to mix – which may be just as well for this year’s Galway summer race festival opening in Ballybrit this evening.
After a weekend of strong south-westerlies, the festival organisers won’t have to worry about marquees taking flight: they already have, with no corporate village booked in for this year.
The loss of the corporate marquees comes a year after Taoiseach Brian Cowen decided that his party had already had enough of its fundraising “tint”.
Former senator and county councillor Nioclas Ó Conchúbhair, who had criticised the “elitist” nature of the tent in a report to former taoiseach Bertie Ahern four years ago, said yesterday he was glad the tent was history.
Mr Ó Conchúbhair, who had chaired a working group set up by the constituency organisation to review aspects of the party’s organisation, said he wouldn’t be at the festival, as he was flying to Spain.
“Yes, I’d go up there in past years but never went near the tent,” he said. “I’d pass the door and wave in, and I’m glad now that the day of stroke politics is gone.”
Mr Ó Conchúbhair credits this change in emphasis to Mr Cowen and Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan. Mr Cowen may be “no film star” but he was “straight, honest, and a leader with terrific ability . . . and no one else wants his very difficult job”.
Despite the demise of the corporate village, Ballybrit racecourse manager John Moloney is still upbeat. Up to 1,800 corporate customers can be hosted in the racecourse’s Millennium and Killanin stands, he said.