Dail Sketch/Michael O'Regan: Taoiseach Bertie Ahern did some overtime yesterday as he bid farewell to the Dáil until late September.
The House rises for its three-month recess tomorrow, and taking the Order of Business for the two remaining days will be the lot of Tánaiste Mary Harney or a Minister.
Ceann Comhairle Dr Rory O'Hanlon noted that the Taoiseach was clocking up extra parliamentary mileage.
"For the benefit of the House, I would point out that we went 18 minutes over time on Leaders' Questions," said Dr O'Hanlon.
"The chair requests all leaders before the autumn to try to find a way of living within the standing order which provides for seven minutes per question, or the chair will have to find a way to ensure this."
It is unlikely that Dr O'Hanlon's warning will dominate the thoughts of Opposition leaders during the recess.
Unsettling the Government will be more like it.
The Opposition read Mr Ahern a bleak end-of-term report before his departure.
Labour leader Pat Rabbitte said the Taoiseach was proposing to adjourn the House without any justification.
"The Government will limp off into the summer recess with the ministerial debris of the parliamentary year still on the front bench," he declared.
Former minister for the environment Noel Dempsey had come up with the idea of spending €52 million on electronic voting, and his successor, Martin Cullen, decided against all advice to implement it, said Mr Rabbitte.
The behaviour of former minister for health Micheál Martin on the nursing homes issues would, according to a former ombudsman, make previous ministers squirm in their graves, he added.
Meanwhile, ministers of state Ivor Callely and Tim O'Malley managed to read the brief but did absolutely nothing.
And, said Mr Rabbitte, there were the issues relating to the delayed Morris tribunal for former and current justice ministers John O'Donoghue and Michael McDowell.
Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny focused on the Government's failure to meet its commitments on overseas development aid.
However, Mr Ahern was in no mood to accept an Opposition dressing down.
Observing Michael D Higgins rising and subsiding like a Galway Bay wave on the Labour benches, he declared: "Deputy Higgins speaks so much and so well on the issue.
" However, he must remember what his government did. It reversed the figure."
Mr Higgins said that Mr Ahern, as minister for finance at that time, was always against extra funding.
Mr Ahern retaliated: "The deputy's party had the worst record on overseas aid."
As Mr Higgins warned Mr Ahern not to "go down that road", the putative rainbow nodded in agreement.
Mr Ahern had his backbenchers egging him on.
The battle lines for the general election are being drawn as the deputies contemplate the summer break.