Ireland isn't really a utopia – it's just its neighbour is a gurning claptrapocracy | Séamas O'Reilly

The country's mild competency over coronavirus can appear to be stone-cold genius compared with the UK's blundering mess

I think being a woman is like being Irish," wrote Dublin-born novelist Iris Murdoch, everyone says you're important and nice, but you take second place all the time." I sometimes think this sentiment reflects my own wariness as an Irish person of taking too many compliments from overseas, and explains why I find congratulations for the country's current government a bit unsatisfying.

The Economist recently called Ireland an unlikely diplomatic superpower", while a leader on these pages praised the enviable beauty" of the Irish political climate. After years of alternating between calling Ireland's Brexit tactics cynical and naive, even the Telegraph this month praised Ireland for taking over the Eurozone" and extending their grip" on the continent's institutions. Having negotiated its way through the Brexit morass, swerved the worst of Covid-19, secured a seat on the UN security council, and won a historic EU judgment that means they have the right to insist the world's richest country does not pay us any tax - hurrah! - Ireland's place in the global hierarchy appears on the rise, and the UK has continued marvelling at the shrewd cunning of their plucky little neighbour.