Was his staff trying to tell him he should take more time off? Taoiseach Bertie Ahern was 46 last week and on Thursday at a surprise party in his department he was presented with a set of golf clubs.
But he doesn't play golf. The gift was chosen on the basis that he had threatened to take up the game. There was champagne, a cake with the greeting in Irish, candles and music arrived when the Minister for Public Enterprise Mary O'Rourke ushered in a Mexican band in town. Departmental secretary Paddy Teahon said a few words and the Secretary to the Government, Frank Murray, clever man that he is, slipped in the typed-up list of FF nominees to the Seanad for the Taoiseach to sign.