Spring delights gallery of the faithful

THEY made Dick Spring the Golden Rose of Tralee yesterday. Well, they always said it is not a beauty contest.

He was in great form at the presentation ceremony, after salmon or beef in the Abbey Gate Hotel. He told the story about a politician who liked to give off-the-cuff speeches and would abandon his 24-page Civil Service script after the first two or three pages to say something like "Enough of that ould Civil Service guff now. Let me speak from the heart". And he would.

Until one day he was delivering a complicated financial statement. This time he stuck to his script, but when he turned page three he was confronted with a simple message: "You're on your own now, sucker."

He talked about the glowing curriculum vitae read out before the presentation made to him by the Tralee Festival president, Mr Seamus O'Halloran, and cast his mind to future days. "Everybody else is wooing Dick Spring again", he observed. "I am keeping my options open", he added.

"There are no knighthoods in Ireland, but this is the next best thing", he said, referring to his Golden Rose, which he insisted on calling the "Order of the Golden Rose".

He referred to Mr O'Halloran's observation that he had been on the first international flight into Kerry. He smiled broadly then, so we knew something punchy was coming.

"Sometimes I believe", he said, referring to people beyond that sacred kingdom and Fianna Failers, "that I live in a country where people don't want their Foreign Minister to fly." They fell out of their seats.

And he proceeded to tell them of all the great plans he had for Tralee, and Kerry. How they were halfway through a 10-year plan to make that little bit of heaven "the premier resort in the country".

But he had to leave. "I have until five o'clock to spend £3 million in Fenit [where he was to launch a new development]," he said. "Ruairi [Quinn] told me if I don't spend it by 5 p.m., then I can't spend it at all".

Then he thanked everyone, including Guinness, for sponsoring every festival in sight. He posed with a nun for photographs and answered the overwhelming question put by an intrepid Irish Times reporter.

It went: "Tanaiste, now that you have received this accolade, what could John or Bertie possibly offer you that would at least be equal, and could also prove either's worthiness to you as a future partner?"

He pursed his lips. He creased his eyebrows. He furrowed his brow. Then he answered: "The Order of the Golden Ministry - rotating." That smile again, and he was gone.

The Rose of Tralee finals continue on RTE 1 television tonight at 9.30.