Estimates Sketch/Frank McNally: A reading from the Book of Estimates. And lo, in the seventh year of his time in the Department of Finance, Moses McCreevy led his people out of slavery and into the promised land.
OK, maybe not the promised land, exactly: in fact, as he rightly said unto us, the latest part of the journey has been "from significant surpluses into deficit territory". But we were going in the right direction, territorially. More prudence, plus the expected international upturn, and we would "reap strong rewards ... in a matter of a couple of years." Amen.
The land of milk and honey, in other words, and just in time for the next general election. No wonder Mr McCreevy seemed so happy with himself yesterday. To hear him tell it, we were in the promised land already. Low unemployment, falling inflation, the new Dublin-Belfast motorway ("amazing"), 40 billion to spend. Even our problems were good problems. His generation never dreamed inward migration would be an issue in Ireland, he mused, having been brought up to expect emigration themselves.
Like last year's estimates presentation, this was not so much a sermon on the mount, as under it. One of the screen projections behind Mr McCreevy showed year-on-year spending increases by Fianna Fáil and the PDs, rising to a dizzy peak in 2001 and plummeting sharply since, like an outline of Croagh Patrick. We would never see 10 per cent economic growth rates again, the Minister said, and his demeanour suggested it was time for spiritual growth instead.
There were no surprises in his presentation, apart from his downright Christian refusal to say anything bad about the Minister for Health.
He was offered several opportunities by the media, and declined them all, praising the health service and wishing Mr Martin well with his €10 billion. He was also invited to express disappointment in Michael Smith, and declined that too. "I'm never disappointed," he chirped, sounding like a nun.
It was hard to see any bad news in his speech either. Partly this was due to his commitment to decentralisation. Pressed to detail the €91 million in stealth charges, he insisted generously on leaving that to the ministers concerned. "I don't want to steal their thunder," he quipped. And the slashed departmental budgets for office machinery, subsistence, incidental expenses, and everything else, were overshadowed by the huge pay increase of benchmarking.
There was an ominous sign of the times ahead when, within hours of the announcement of cuts under the "information society" heading, Leinster House announced that the Internet and e-mail service would be down today .
And speaking of information, a 4 cent cut in funding for Gen de Chastelain's office suggests he might be even harder to contact by phone before the next round of decommissioning.
But Mr McCreevy preferred to accentuate the positive about the benchmarking bill. The Government would be investing "in people", he said. A point further emphasised by the Department of Agriculture's estimate, where there were swingeing cuts under the headings of "disease eradication" and "control of horses".