Fr Eamon chastises Little Brian at end of term

LITTLE Brian Biffo was itching to clear his desk and run off into the long grass of his two month summer holidays.

He just had one more assembly to get through with that moany Mr Kenny and preachy Fr Gilmore. What. A. Drag.

Little Brian was slumped in his seat, his body language screaming contempt for Mr Kenny as the so-called leader of the so- called opposition started telling him off yet again: “blah, blah, disgrace, blah, blah, failure, blah blah mass unemployment...”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, Enda, heard it all before mate,” Little Brian thought as his mind drifted off to all the fun he was gonna have at that caravan park in Connemara just as soon as he got out of this dump.

Some of the bolder Fianna Fáil boys behind started cheeking Mr Kenny, telling him he was an aul’ one, always droning and groaning – get a bit of ‘tude, dude. Jaysus, they laughed.

Then Fr Gilmore stood up and everyone on the Fianna Fáil benches stopped giggling and tried not to look guilty.

You couldn’t mess with Fr Gilmore like you could soppy Mr Kenny; no, he wouldn’t stand for it. He just gave you that look and started really laying into you, like. He was a bit scary. Fr Gilmore didn’t quite use the words, but what he meant was: “You big liar Brian. You’ve had that Bord Snip Nua report with the looming €5bn cuts in it for ages and you’ve just hidden it under your bed, haven’t you?

“The baby Jesus knows you’re lying Brian, come on own up! You’re only making it worse for yourself. You just bang another nail into the sacred heart of the blessed Mother with every little fib that comes tumbling out of your mouth, Brian. You’re a very bold little Taoiseach, that you are.

“You were meant to hand that report in as your homework before the end of term, but you’re just too scared to, that’s the truth now isn’t it Brian?”

Fr Gilmore even suggested that the Dáil should sit on past the end of the session on Friday until the Taoiseach handed over the long-delayed report – the Labour leader wanted to put the whole House into detention because of little Brian’s naughtiness.

This mad little Brian fumed so much he rolled his eyes as Fr Gilmore was speaking and deliberately looked away from him, then he stood right up and answered Fr Gilmore back.

“Another rhetorical flourish,” he chided sarcastically almost under his breath.

Fr Gilmore tried to break-in again, but little Brian was having none of it and snapped: “As if you didn’t get long enough to talk already.”

Ooooh, little Brian was very angry now and didn’t mind who knew it.

But Fr Gilmore was very cross and got up to chastise the wayward head of Government once more.

“You’ve made a total mess of the NAMA drama, haven’t you Brian?

“You said it was urgent in April and now it’s July and you won’t be able to put your plans together till September – you’re a ditherer!” he exclaimed.

This really got to little Brian. “We did not dither”, he said, trying not to dither as he did so.

Little Brian also denied Fr Gilmore’s claim he’d gone to sleep during the slump as he insisted he was busy “growing jobs”.

But if that were the case he must have planted the seeds the wrong way round and they’ve popped up in Australia on the other side of the world, because in this country unemployment has more than doubled in the past 12 months, to more than 400,000 people.

Little Brian had got through the final assembly of the truncated Dáil term, but he won’t get through another year of failure like this one.