When the going gets tough, the gritless minister gets going – as chilled-out Cabinet play it cool on deep freeze

WITH all the skill and efficiency of a bomb planting operation by Slovakian intelligence, the Government finally swung into action to deal with the worst winter weather crisis for nearly half a century.

Noel Dempsey put a new spin on the old political maxim that when the going gets tough, the tough get going as the Transport Minister got going out of the country just as the road mess he is meant to sort out froze the country in its icy grip.

Talk about getting the last flight out of a failed state. Mr Dempsey clearly knows his department better than we thought and realised the roads would remain ungritted, all bus transport would cease from mid-afternoon in the capital due to a well predicted shower of snow, and trying to make use of the airports, trains and rural routes would become a game of Russian roulette.

Who could blame him for fleeing the scene of this crime of bad planning? Well, just about everyone left stumbling on the icy, unsalted pavements and swerving on the death- sheet roads on this shivering little island, I suppose.

But what of the rest of the strangely chilled-out Cabinet?

Defence Minister Willie O’Dea finally popped his head out the Government igloo bunker to offer a few soldiers to dig out dead sheep, but only if anyone asked them – don’t expect leadership from this Government.

Mr O’Dea was last seen slip-sliding across the news as he managed to shoot himself in both feet at once by totally failing to understand the emergency plan he is supposed to be in charge of. After railing against local authorities for not taking charge of the problem, it was pointed out to him that his own emergency plan clearly stated that, ahem, a national response was needed, not a local one.

Mr O’Dea then hit the ice with all the grace and panache of a bear on ice-skates as he scrambled all over the place. He insisted the plan was working perfectly well as the Government had only decided it was an emergency “the other day” when ministers saw the weather forecast. You really couldn’t make this Cabinet up.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen was presumed missing in the blizzards until he suddenly appeared at Government Buildings, but sadly seemed to be still in the middle of snow-where.

Then, hurrah! A break in the crisis as the Government convened the Emergency Response Committee – just some 20 days after the emergency first began.

Things were looking up, or rather the Taoiseach was looking down as he mumbled his way through a less than convincing defence of the Government’s crisis mismanagement so far.

He was very tetchy when asked about Mr Dempsey’s holiday, but did not seem to feel it was a problem to have the transport supremo out of the country as the transport network ground to a halt. Most bizarre.

Even though a path had been cleared across the pavement for ministers, Eamon O’Cuiv still nearly went head over heels as he exited the building – an apt metaphor for a wrong-footed Government.

Perhaps we have been too hard on the Slovaks: compared to the shower in charge of this country, they look positively competent.

It only took Bratislava three days to remember to tell Dublin they’d accidently let 100g of explosives find its way into Ireland. Here, it took three weeks for ministers to think of convening the so-called emergency response committee to try and co-ordinate the handling of the widely predicted severe weather crisis which has wreaked havoc across transport, education, emergency wards and business.

And most remarkably of all the head of Slovakia’s border police actually resigned over the plastic explosives fiasco.

Can we expect a letter of resignation from any of our ministers after the appallinglyresponse to this Arctic gridlock?

No. But we might get a postcard from Mr Dempsey if we’re lucky.