They came, they canvassed and they promised. "We'd give you the sun, moon and stars if we could. But would you settle for a warm radiator on a winter's night?"
Election promises have been lavished like the proverbial confetti during this campaign. And yesterday the Dublin North East Labour candidate added a major one to the growing pile.
Dr Sean Kenny promised that Labour would install central heating in all local authority housing.
"A large number of local authority houses don't have central heating," he said in a statement. "Labour will get Dublin Corporation - and every other local authority in the country - to draw up plans to provide this."
Anticipating a cynical response, Dr Kenny insisted that Labour had "made a commitment to delivering on our promises - and our record shows we do what we say we'll do. A whopping 95 per cent of the commitments in the programme for government have been met."
A party spokesman said he did not have "detailed costings" for the plans but it would cost around £2 million a year over five years.
In the meantime, Labour's Joe Costello felt a hot flush. He "warmly welcomed" the announcement that Gallanstown in Dublin would be tax designated as an enterprise area.
Mr Costello had already been warm in his welcome for the announcement in the dim distant time BC (before campaign). On April 29th he and his party colleague, Roisin Shortall, whose constituency was also blessed, rushed out late night welcomes for the move which had yet to be "officially" announced by Mr Quinn.
There is nothing as tasty as that second bite of the cherry during election time.
