It's not just banks that need stress tests – so does the public after being subjected to a barrage of waffle, writes MIRIAM LORD
IT’S NOT just the banks that need to be stress tested this morning.
Our brains have turned to mush. Our heads hurt.
Talk. Talk. Talk. Talk.
Make it stop. Oh, please make it stop! “Now we turn to Prof Toldewso, dean of the school of applied punditry and doom at a panel discussion near you.”
Bondholders . . . billions . . . banks . . . bailout . . . blah, blah, blah . . . haircut.
Can’t anyone make them go away? “And it’s over next to deputies Joan Noonan-Bruton and Eamon Kenny, still fulminating on the plinth . . . ” Drone. Harrumph. Quiver.
No! Here’s the Taoiseach again. Welcome, Brian. Again.
Typical. You wait two years for the sound of a Biffo and then suddenly it’s a convoy of Cowens, queuing up to talk to the camera.
Yet. More. Bleedin’. Talk.
What a horrendous day it was yesterday. From daybreak right through until midnight, the aural onslaught was unrelenting.
We’ll never say a bad word about Brendan Balfe again.
Yes, we know we’re up the creek and the wolves from the IMF are at the door and only mad to huff and puff and blow our house down, except that the house is already gone into Nama and we’re only clinging onto the deeds for sentimental value.
But you can have too much of a bad thing.
It’s bad enough to find ourselves the unwilling extras in their financial snuff movie, but worse still to have to endure every frame of the unfolding catastrophe.
Of course, one must always look on the bright side.
Brian Lenihan did his best, kicking off the Black Thursday gloomfest with an early morning confirmation that we’re nearly, but not quite, doomed.
Although with his Government’s inglorious track record in the prediction department, why anybody should believe him, and his “final” figure of what the bank bailouts will cost us, is anyone’s guess. Still, the good news is the pain is “manageable”. That’s a relief.
The bad news is that it’ll take more than two paracetamol and a day in bed to cure this particular headache.
He said he wouldn’t be bringing forward the budget by a month, as some were suggesting. Instead, he will be publishing “a framework for the next four budgets” in November. Which will be far worse than any one budget. It’ll be a handy guide for the torture to come.
Think if we had Hello! magazine in the 15th century (possible title, Hell!): “Torquemada shows us inside his beautiful dungeon,” which is what Brian will be doing with his November framework.
The Minister for Finance’s press conference only lasted half an hour – how long do you need to don a black cap and pass sentence on an economy? – before he had to rush back to the Dáil.
When the bells for the start-of-business began to ring, he left the squawking local and international financial correspondents in his wake declaring: “I’m needed in the Dáil. I don’t have a pair.” The out-of-towners looked baffled.
Irish financial journalists, still reeling from what they had just heard, muttered to each other: “He better grow a pair quick, so.”
Fine Gael’s James Reilly was on the case later in the day during a radio interview. “We have the cajones to do it,” he told the nation.
Not so sure. Enda Kenny looked a broken man when the Dáil resumed, his party reeling from the latest opinion poll figures. He looked like he’d had little sleep, his eyes red-rimmed and clouded by dark circles. Those who plotted against him before the summer were huddling again in the corridors. This time though, the talk was of leaving, not heaving.
But after all he’s been through, will their leader step aside for them? Fine Gael’s latest difficulty came as manna to deputies on the Government benches. Try as they might, they couldn’t hide their smirks as Enda did his best to get through the Order of Business.
“Ireland woke up this morning to another national crisis,” he began, “but it’s not business as usual.” Cue derisory snorts from the backbench bootboys across the chamber, as they applied his words to the situation in Fine Gael. The Government’s “credibility is now in tatters”, said Kenny, and they clutched their sides in Fianna Fáil and tried not to laugh too loudly.
As the day wore on, and the financial crisis elbowed out the latest little political hiccup in the main Opposition party, Enda seemed to regain a little confidence.
It’s just as well. He looked shattered earlier on as he sat in the chamber, fiddly distractedly with a button on his jacket, staring into space while one or two of his backbenchers grinned knowingly behind him.
Michael Noonan stepped into the media breach with a string of choice soundbites on the banking crisis, taking the heat off his leader.
Meanwhile, the Taoiseach continued his media offensive, leaving no microphone unmolested and offering himself for interview at every opportunity. It was hard to tell whether this was man fighting hard for his country, or fighting even harder for his job.
Whatever, Biffo is certainly putting himself about. He even appeared in the canteen at lunchtime, dining with Tallaght TD Charlie O’Connor.
There was a run on the turkey, so he happily put himself on the outside of a large portion of steak and kidney pie.
Meanwhile, there was a plaintive tweet from Dan Boyle of the Greens. “There can be no sugar coating. These figures are truly horrendous. It tests our willingness to be a responsible party in government.” (Feeling a little left out, one suspects.)
And with the talk of catastrophe still in the air, Fine Gael couldn’t even enjoy reaching that elusive highpoint which they have craved for so long.
They’re even stevens with Fianna Fáil now. Unfortunately, both are on the skids. But that was lost in the miasma of talk and more talk yesterday.
So here’s a heartfelt request from a public which has suffered enough and knows that more pain, however managed, is on the way: Shut up!