IT WAS a dullish morning in what one delegate described as the "deadest TUI congress in 500 years" when it seemed as if the sleepy delegates received an electric charge.
The issue of casualisation and part time working conditions hit the floor. Unfortunately for the Minister for Education, her arrival coincided with this outburst.
As she waited, heading a solemn procession of Department officials and acolytes outside, the door of the conference hall, one angry delegate took the microphone.
"Are we going to jettison this very valuable contribution which highlights the disgraceful part time work situation in order to facilitate the main orchestrator of it - the Minister?" he asked delegates.
The minutes ticked away and the Minister waited, seemingly unperturbed.
Ten minutes elapsed before Ms Breathnach entered the hall, to exhortations from the platform to give her a "traditional TUI welcome".
The applause rose to what could best be described as a polite level as she walked to the platform, elegant in her signal red suit. The phrase "a red rag to a bull" sprang to mind.
Her speech passed uninterrupted by unseemly spontaneous applause. At the end, soothed by the cadences of her voice and the length of the script, the delegates so far forget themselves as to clap in an almost enthusiastic manner.
Then the atmosphere heated up perceptibly as the union's president responded to the speech in a traditional hard hitting trade union manner.
Her speech, which included a list of sins of omission by the Minister, was punctuated by at least 12 bursts of appreciative "hear, hear" and much enthusiastic clapping.
A prolonged standing ovation awaited her at the end. It was game, set and match to Ms Alice Prendergast, first woman president of the TUI and soccer referee.
Meanwhile, Mr Jim Dorney, the union's general secretary, had to leave the platform without his much hoped far Easter present. He had wanted the issue of pension rights for days lost in industrial disputes to be resolved by the Minister, but she didn't even mention the subject.
Oh well, what's another year?