The Clare Champion Clare news, sport, entertainment and local notes
LEAKING is a popular Leinster House pastime, but Wednesday afternoon saw a rather unique one and it came about as Clare TD Cathal Crowe was speaking.
“It sounds unbelievable but there was a debate about biodiversity and I was after saying that wooden beams from the wood in Cratloe had been used to construct the roof of the House of Commons. As I was speaking about it I could see a drop falling and I said would you believe it, the roof is leaking here.”
He said that the leak came about during a thunderstorm.
The roof of the Dáil chamber is leaking… 🌂 @McConnellDaniel @aoifegracemoore @LouiseByrneNews @sandra_hurley @JOEdotie @MichealLehane pic.twitter.com/Am2eAuQrhV
— Cathal Crowe T.D. (@CathalCroweTD) October 19, 2022
“There’s a glass skylight above the Dáil Chamber that the public wouldn’t generally see, it’s high above us. You could see a few flashes of lighting, and as I was speaking about Cratloe Woods and how its timber roofed the House of Commons, our own roof sprung a leak.”
It lightened the mood in the Chamber. “The Taoiseach quipped ‘Raindrops keep falling on my head’. There were a few more quips around the floor about leaks in the Dáil, and this being the first water leak we’ve had.”
The leak comes three years after a major refurbishment of the Dáil.
“It caught everyone by surprise, it was the cause of a lot of levity and joking but there’s obviously a problem with the roof and a lot of money has obviously gone into it. It was dripping close to the microphone system, which could be a hazard in itself, but so far the Chamber has continued to function,” he said on Wednesday evening.
Owen Ryan
Owen Ryan has been a journalist with the Clare Champion since 2007, having previously worked for a number of other regional titles in Limerick, Galway and Cork.
