Miriam Lord: Leaders’ Questions leave everyone feeling a bit cuckoo

The Dáil reconvened at two o’clock on Tuesday.

Anyone playing the Mary Lou Leaders’ Questions drinking game (raise your glass for every cliche) would have been completely buckled by quarter past.

But with investment funds buying up forever homes as her chosen topic, anyone foolish enough to risk their liver had only themselves to blame.

Relying on a story from Viscount Rothermere’s Irish Daily Mail, the Sinn Féin leader grabbed a golden opportunity to tackle the Taoiseach for the umpteenth time on an issue dear to her heart: cuckoo funds.

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On Saturday, Craig Hughes reported that the Department of Finance is planning to hold “roadshows” next year aimed at enticing international funds to invest in Irish residential property.

Apparently the boys with the big bucks are “spooked” by the ongoing political ructions here over institutional investors bulk-buying houses and elbowing individual homebuyers out of the market.

Recent tax changes, coupled with uncertainty over whether more might be in the pipeline, have fuelled uncertainly and the Merrion Street mandarins feel “a market-facing event” fronted by a couple of heavyweight Ministers might encourage international capital into the country.

According to departmental documents, two names are in the frame. Comments from their spokespeople indicate that Paschal Donohoe, the Fine Gael Minister for Finance, seems gung-ho about the wheeze but Darragh O’Brien, the Fianna Fáil Minister for Housing, does not appear so enthusiastic about attending.

“State’s ploy to attract cuckoo funds” was the headline over Saturday’s piece. To be fair to Mary Lou McDonald, neither she nor her speech writer were going to pass up on a chance to repeatedly clobber the Taoiseach around the ears with the words “cuckoo funds”.

Dozen mentions

She fell just one short of a dozen mentions in the course of two questions, enough to render most devotees of the Mary Lou Leaders’ Questions drinking game pie-eyed.

“Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have bent over backwards for cuckoo funds,” she began.

Cheers!

“Sweetheart deals.”

Sláinte!

“Sweep in” and “gobble up homes” from “under the noses of ordinary home-buyers.”

Gulp!

“They literally hung the flag of surrender up over Dublin for these investors.”

Swig!

Paschal Donohoe and Darragh O’Brien are “looking to dust off the red carpet and roll it out” for these wealthy institutions.

Down the hatch!

“Here we go again with a Fianna Fáil-led government and cuckoo funds.”

Slurp!

Faced with the choice of looking after hard-pressed renters and big business, “well, you’ve shown whose side you’re on.”

Bottoms up!

The Taoiseach and his Ministers are “running after” and “cosying up” even further to these wealthy funds.

Hic!

Government politicians know that being closely associated with international investment firms and pension fund vehicles is toxic.

“There is no public support for this insanity,” the Sinn Féin leader told the Taoiseach. She is pushing an open door here – a simple action in itself which too many individuals and families can’t afford to do these days because of a dysfunctional property market.

Inward investment

So what about “your Ministers’ proposed cuckoo fund roadshow”, Mary Lou asked Micheál Martin, forever linking the department’s inward investment drive to the publicly reviled bulk-buy-to-rent-out merchants.

Did he know about it? Does he approve of it? Who were his Ministers going to meet? What new, extra sweetheart deals are they going to promise the investors buying up ordinary people’s houses?

Straight off, in Irish and then in English, the Taoiseach said the Sinn Féin leader is wrong in her assertion that his Government is in league with financial cuckoo and vulture funds.

But Mary Lou wasn’t backing down, despite a very comprehensive rundown from Micheál detailing building projects completed or under way along with the many policy and funding initiatives his Government has put in place to address the housing crisis.

“Why do I say all of that?” he asked at the end of delivering this extensive list.

“Because you don’t want to answer my question,” said Mary Lou.

He was saying it to counter her “propaganda spin” masquerading as a question and “designed to portray Government housing policy as being exclusively about one thing and one thing only”. Trying to make it out as being almost exclusively about cuckoo funds was “wide of the mark, disingenuous and dishonest”, he said angrily.

As for this planned roadshow?

“There is no roadshow,” he snapped at the end of a shouting match between the two. “Not true. Not true.”

Who said anything about being against investment? “Nobody,” said Mary Lou. “Ireland is open for business. We all know that.”

Lessons

But the cuckoo funds. What sweetheart deals are they getting to entice them over here? Has the Government learned any lessons at all? Not at all, concluded Mary Lou. Here we go again with Fianna Fáil in Government and cuckoo funds.

“Soundbite nonsense,” fumed the Minister for Housing.

Of course, in this long-running cuckoo conflict between Mary Lou and Micheál, the Taoiseach has amassed a few favourite soundbites of his own.

Time to open another bottle?

Maybe a small one.

In what was deputy McDonald indulging? “A lot of bluff and bluster.” Chin-chin!

“And nothing to back it up.”

G’luck!

Mary Lou was not amused. “You’re making a show of yourself,” she told him.

Really? Micheál noted that all the Government gets from Sinn Féin when it brings in legislation on affordable housing is “repeated negativity and opposition”.

Glug!

“Until, wait for it, what happens when the divisions bells ring? Sinn Féin meekly go in and support the affordable housing legislation.” The party’s “extraordinary, repeated and consistent” opposition to housing developments all over the country is “rank hypocrisy”.

Salut!

No roadshow and no cosying up to cuckoo funds, insisted Micheál.

Mary Lou harried, demanding further answers.

“Out of order,” complained the Taoiseach as the barrage continued.

“Many things are out of order,” said the Sinn Féin leader.

The Minister for Housing came in with a sliding tackle, bringing hostilities to close.

“You take everything from the Daily Mail,” shouted Darragh O’Brien.

That stung Mary Lou.

At the end, they all looked like they needed a stiff drink.

Within an hour of the exchanges, Sinn Féin had a tweet up along with a video clip.

“Here we go again! The Government looks set to delay vital transport infrastructure across the state BUT the FF/FG roadshow to attract more Cuckoo funds into Ireland is still on track –”

And so did the party leader. “Govt cozying up to Cuckoo funds as our people face a housing crisis. Taoiseach won’t answer questions on this – just bluff and bluster. #FFFGCuckoos”

Hic!