Lee stakes an early claim for a seat on the front bench

The golden boy of the Opposition raised some eyebrows sitting beside his party leader

IS HE an innocent abroad? Or a quick learner? Or does he know something nobody else is aware of? George Lee, Fine Gael’s golden boy, looked very comfortable sitting on the front bench yesterday morning – even though he is not yet a member of the front bench.

It’s a nice slot to have to sit beside the party leader or deputy leader in this instance, because it guarantees the TD in question will be in TV footage if an issue is on the news.

There were a few puzzled looks from his colleagues but nobody said anything to their new colleague.

Probably nobody explained to him that during the Order of Business only the front bench sit on the front bench. But as one observer put it “when you’re the hero, nobody says anything”.

And so George sat among his frontbench colleagues, with an even better view of the Ministers sitting directly opposite, and no doubt eagle-eyed for any sleepers or meditators.

Minister for the Arts Martin Cullen did briefly close his eyes but that was during the carefully enunciated and lengthy contribution of Sinn Féin’s Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin, a man definitely not known for brevity.

But it was guillotines and rule by decree that dominated the Order of Business.

Labour’s Emmet Stagg had on Wednesday described the final weeks in the run-up to the summer recess as “guillotine season” and his party colleague Joan Burton yesterday pointed out that five Bills had been guillotined.

Next week seven are to be guillotined, as the usual legislative bottleneck builds up in a bid before the end of the session.

Joan complained that the Government was effectively ruling by decree, because cutting off Bills without sufficient debate was effectively ruling by decree.

One of the next week’s Bills – the beautifully named Financial Services Miscellaneous Provisions Bill – will get a maximum of three hours. This is the Bill that will allow the Minister for Finance to extend the bank guarantee scheme. Joan claimed it would be a €60 billion millstone around the necks of future generations.

The irony was that just a few hours later the Dáil had to adjourn for three hours because they got through two Bills well in advance of any deadline.

Next week will be another matter, however, with late sittings all the way.