WE HEAR that the Canadian government has given up trying to sell Strathmore, the handsome Victorian residence out in Killiney it bought for its ambassadors in 1965.

Now, it is planning to open the house it up again for its man in Dublin.

Pat Binns, Canada’s ambassador to Ireland, is likely to move soon from his penthouse apartment in the Four Seasons Hotel in Ballsbridge back to the seaside.

Although the €17m price for the nine-acre property with sweeping views over Killiney Bay seemed more than reasonable back in September, agent Lisney wasn’t beating back buyers.

But by Christmas, serious negotiations were going on with at least one interested party – until the deal fell through not long afterwards.

Since then, it seems there’s been little interest in the property, which needs work but is an undeniably handsome building.

It seems the save-our-embassy campaigners, who mounted a lively protest last autumn to get the Canadians to take Strathmore off the market, are going to win by default.