The Dail may be too traditional and caught in a time warp of outdated procedures but Drapier must confess that he is a sucker for the ceremony and sense of occasion that still surrounds the Budget.
It is one of the great Dail occasions, when every seat in the House is occupied and expectation hangs in the air. It matters little that nowadays the Budget measures are usually well market-tested in advance. In a coalition government where both parties compete in leaking, there are usually few surprises. Although, with a Finance Minister with Charlie McCreevy's reputation, one never knows.
Budget Day remains one of the great Parliamentary occasions. The serried ranks behind the Minister of the day are either, in good times, loud in their cheers or, in difficult times, mute as mice. The Ceann Comhairle delivers the time-honoured warning about the confidentiality that attaches to the Budget document, although it is being simultaneously broadcast and is being dissected line by line in every stockbroker's office in the State.
But woe betide any Deputy who leaves the Chamber with a copy of the Minister's address. Until quite recently only former ministers and Opposition spokesmen and women were given a copy of the speech as the Minister got to his feet. This left backbenchers more freedom to bait each other across the floor, with victory going to whichever side had the advantage on the day.
The advantage on this occasion lay with the most fortunate Minister in the history of budgets. Oldtimers in here were in disbelief at the largesse at the Minister's disposal. The proposition was still being canvassed that, notwithstanding his abundance of riches, McCreevy could still fall through a trapdoor of his own making.
In Drapier's view, Charlie McCreevy is not the loose cannon that is popularly believed. His downfall last year was not because he was reckless or careless but because he deliberately engaged, without preparing the ground, in an element of social engineering that caused outrage.
The only people as surprised as the Minister at the tornado of protest were those at the top of the ICTU. Otherwise, the Minister was hung out to dry as his own colleagues headed for the plinth to disown him. Of course, Bertie Ahern had no hand, act or part in either individualisation or in the protests of FF backbenchers that followed.
Michael Noonan is probably right when he says that this year the Budget was designed by a committee and the Minister kept under house arrest when the social partners were not riding shotgun on him. The prospect of the biggest pot of gold in the history of Irish budgets being enveloped in another storm of protest was more than Bertie could contemplate as he strives for an each-way bet concerning the timing of the general election.
And so the great give-away on this occasion embraced all sections, except the besieged farmers, although Derek McDowell of Labour is well justified in pointing out that the choices made were almost invariably in favour of the better-off.
McDowell has suffered from the inevitable comparison with Michael Noonan's performance last year and from comparisons to Noonan and Pat Rabbitte in previous budgets. Although his content is creditable, the ability to command the theatre that is the Dail Chamber on Budget Day and, as Vincent Browne highlighted, the capacity to extemporise with conviction and some passion are both essential.
He did, however, anticipate the PPF patch-up deal in advance of the Budget between Government and social partners from Joe O'Toole's antics in the Seanad. So far neither the Finance Minister nor the alert Senator has told us whether the renovation job will bring the secondary teachers back on side.
Indeed, Drapier can't help wondering if the egregious Senator O'Toole was part of Michael Noonan's committee that designed the Budget. Close observers of the scene noted the divergence of response as between the trade unions and the Labour Party - or perhaps that should read the trade union hierarchy and the Labour Party.
Meanwhile, Bertie must be happy to have reached Budget Day without being forced to throw a Minister of State overboard. Willie O'Dea's support for the taxi-men and his denigration of PD Minister Bobby Molloy was the subject of a no-confidence motion by Fine Gael. Willie survived because Willie did what Willie always does when his own patch is threatened. The only difference on this occasion, as Willie himself acknowledged, was that his remarks were recorded.
Apparently, everything would be normal only for the record of his comments.
The Ned O'Keeffe affair is more substantial and more threatening for the Government if only because the BSE issue itself is so horrifically serious. Dr Mary Upton of the Labour Party probably didn't fully appreciate how prescient was her motion on Private Members' Business or how foolish the response of the Government given subsequent events.
If the circumstances in the Ned O'Keeffe affair had arisen in Britain, the Food Minister would be gone within 24 hours. Joe Walsh's defence of his Junior Minister did no service to farmers or consumers and must have raised a lot of eyebrows amongst his colleague European ministers. And the cant about there being no illegality entirely misses the point. It was notable on Wednesday that Brendan Howlin (standing in for Ruairi Quinn) had Bertie on the run. Somehow Drapier feels that the Ned O'Keeffe affair has not gone away.
The long-awaited Government proposals on business funding of politics, capping party contributions at £20,000 and candidate donations at £5,000, read as if the various tribunals had never happened. Sinn Fein has been loud in its condemnation of corruption in politics but judging from Gerry Adams's irritated response, financial donations are acceptable so long as they are in dollars. Perhaps there are things worse than corruption after all!