RADIO DEBATE: THERE WERE six people on the panel, but the Today FM live debate on the Lisbon Treaty yesterday quickly turned into The Mick and Declan Show.
Minutes after presenter Matt Cooper noted wryly that Michael O’Leary was running late, the Ryanair boss bustled in, arms laden with books on the Lisbon Treaty which he promptly distributed to his fellow panellists.
Wasting no time during his 90-second opening slot, O’Leary directed the first of several barbs at Libertas founder Declan Ganley.
“Please don’t listen to the lobby of losers trying to persuade you to vote No in two weeks’ time. They are all a bunch of failed politicians,” O’Leary said, going on to describe the pinstripe-suited Ganley as someone who “would like to be Dana but he can’t get elected”.
The Libertas leader chuckled and couldn’t resist reminding O’Leary of his previous criticisms of the European Commission as “Stalinist” and “an evil empire” run by “morons” and “gobshites”.
Or the fact that last year O’Leary had criticised the idea of another Lisbon referendum, arguing that “only in the European Union, Ireland and Zimbabwe are you forced to vote twice”.
An unrepentant O’Leary rolled his eyes. “Accept No for an answer Declan and bugger off,” he drawled, before taunting Ganley that even Dana had bettered his tilt at the European Parliament. During the debate, which took place in The Irish Times building, there were plenty of references to O’Leary taking to the skies with EU transport commissioner Antonio Tajani or “my new friend commissioner Tajani”, as the Ryanair boss put it with a smirk earlier this week as part of the Ryanair Yes campaign.
Socialist Party leader and MEP Joe Higgins raised a laugh when he quipped that it was the equivalent of the Bailey brothers taking the head of An Bord Pleanála on a pub crawl.
Alluding to O’Leary’s run-ins with Brussels over his bid to take over Aer Lingus, Ganley jeered that anyone who has seen The Sopranos knows “where the commission has you, Mick”. As The Mick and Declan show continued, with much verbal jousting and tittering between the two, the other panellists tried their best to keep the tone solemn.
Batting for the Yes camp were Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin and Independent MEP Marian Harkin, with Higgins and former MEP Patricia McKenna on the No side. But their contributions were mostly the rather predictable arguments that have been well aired by now.
O’Leary had to make an early exit, and soon after Ganley’s jocular manner evaporated following a snippy comment from Martin about his “obsession with Britain” and the involvement of the UKIP in this year’s Lisbon campaign.
“Don’t question my patriotism,” Ganley thundered.