FOREIGN property touts have been getting a bad name lately, with many people questioning the freedom with which they can promise overnight capital appreciation and rental yields that are "guaranteed".

But Brian Cowen seems unlikely to bring the sector to heel. Addressing the Irish Management Institute conference at Druid's Glen last week, the finance minister said he had never given the issue a moment's thought to regulating the sale of property overseas, despite the millions of euro being poured in by Irish investors every year.

Cowen admitted he would not buy in Bulgaria himself but he does not want to lecture other people on how they should spend their money.

Being a cautious man, the minister prefers to keep his money close to home, confining his overseas property interests to a buyto-let flat in Leeds, according to the latest declaration of politicians' interest.

Some of his Fianna Fail colleagues are far more adventurous. Junior minister Frank Fahey owns a home in swanky Villefranche in France and has deposits on four properties in Portugal. This is on top of shares in houses in Boston and Brussels, plus at least 16 properties in Ireland.

Defence minister Willie O'Dea has bought in Paris while Sean Ardagh has invested in eastern Europe.

Across the political divide, the Labour Party's Derek McDowell has bought property in Cape Town while Gerard Murphy of Fine Gael owns an apartment in Poland plus a half-share in a twobedroom property in Florida.

FEELING THE ENERGY - PART ONE

CONTROVERSIAL health guru and "mind technology" consultant Tony Quinn has been credited with helping over 80 Irish investors discover a major oil find in the central American country of Belize.

Belize Natural Energy (BNE), a company jointly headed by Denver-based Susan Morrice, a sister of former Northern Ireland assembly member Jane Morrice, claims to have so far detected three large potential oil deposits in Belize. Irish investors have so far stumped up $6m for the project, while the company sent a shipment of oil to a Houston refinery late last year, netting BNE $2m in revenue.

In an interview with the LA Times last week, BNE director Sheila McCaffrey said that all the company's directors and almost all of its directors had attended a course held by Quinn.

According to the report, McCaffrey related how she could "feel the energy" from one the company's oil fields.

Morrice has previous failed to respond to a number of requests from the Sunday Tribune for interview.

She did not reply to an email sent last week.

Morrice and her husband, Alex Cranberg, both attended a Tony Quinn seminar in the Bahamas in 2002. She described Quinn's 'Ecudor' seminar as being about "learning from within - by being, by truly living. It's about big thinking globally but also in terms of using 100% of your mind, " she told a local newspaper.

FEELING THE ENERGY - PART TWO

IRISH energy impresario David Horgan of PanAndean Resources and his team are scheduled to meet Venezuelan oil minister Rafael Ramirez tomorrow in London.

The timing of the meeting renders it pregnant with possibility, coming just days after Venezuela flamboyantly seized oil fields producing 115,000 barrels a day from French major Total and Italy's Eni and soon after supermajor ExxonMobil relinquished a smaller field yielding 15,000 barrels a day rather than submit to tightened terms from the Chavez government.

Horgan's earlier success in securing deals in, erm, challenging political situations in Iraq and Bolivia can only augur well.

MOBILE RIOT

POLICE were called to control crowds attending the opening of mobile phone shops across Trinidad and Tobago as Denis O'Brien's mobile phone group Digicel marked its entry to the Caribbean country.

Prior to Digicel's arrival TSTT, a mobile company partly owned by Cable and Wireless, had been the monopoly player in the country. Digicel has spent $200m ( 165m) since acquiring a mobile licence in Trinidad and Tobago last June.

The opening of the retail network was eagerly anticipated, according to a spokeswoman for Digicel, and many of the 200 Digicel outlets attracted crowds of hundreds of shoppers.

Local newspaper reports said police had to intervene to keep crowds at bay and clear traffic jams in a number of locations including the capital Port Of Spain.

According to a policeman quoted in a report in the Trinidad Express, crowds in the provincial town of Point Fortin caused a "massive traffic pile-up along the main road".

"Obviously there was excitement, " said the Digicel spokeswoman, adding that it was "normal course when there are large queues of people" to have a police presence.