Breathing new life into 1916

RadioReview: There was I thinking the Rising was the name of a rock festival when everyone started talking about the 90th anniversary of 1916. All through the week, radio re-enactments and debates brought the anniversary to life in the most vivid fashion, with neither the passage of time nor recent memories of the Northern conflict hindering a lively and muscular debate on the actions of Pearse, Connolly et al.

As historian Diarmaid Ferriter pointed out to Eddie Hobbs, who was filling the rejuvenated shoes of Marian Finucane (RTÉ Radio 1, Sunday), it was President Mary McAleese who effectively lit the fuse for subsequent arguments with her take on events delivered earlier in the year, while new material available to researchers has cast a fresh light on the role played by previously neglected groups, such as women or British soldiers. The media has played its part in recreating the events of that Easter and their aftermath in newspaper supplements and various re-enactments staged on RTÉ Radio 1 during the week (This Week and Morning Ireland, for example).

Strange then, that a tense Bertie Ahern, in an interview on This Week (RTÉ Radio 1, Sunday), sounded like someone who had organised a party and was afraid no one would come. We'll see tomorrow.

Strange, too, that Eddie Hobbs spent more time talking about the War of Independence than 1916.

Not once, but twice, he "treated" us to a preview of the Leinster-Munster rugby game, a full fortnight before it takes place. There were staccato silences at one point, as Hobbs wrestled with the voices coming in through his headphones and a breakdown in phone lines, yet within minutes he was assuring us that the calls were coming in "thick and fast".

There was plenty of financial talk, too, as you'd expect from Mr Show Me the Money. Some of it, such as a discussion on the flotation of Aer Lingus, was legitimate, but did we have to listen to an hour's whingeing by various contributors about their failed foreign property adventures? It put in mind personal finance journalist Jill Kerby's recent description of the boom in credit-driven property speculation as "people buying things they don't need with money they don't have" (Breakfast Show with Eamon Dunphy, NewsTalk 106).

At least Hobbs, who doesn't lack confidence in any medium, gave Minister for Agriculture Mary Coughlan a thorough going-over on the avian flu issue, to the point where the Minister started wailing down the phone from Donegal about "skulduggery" and other such conspiracies in the framing of the item.

The other big party this week was the 100th anniversary of Samuel Beckett's birthday. RTÉ ran plays throughout the week, read three novels in their entirety on medium wave and devoted a Rattlebag special (RTÉ Radio 1, Thursday) to the greatest writer to hail from Foxrock, while the BBC opted to run its Beckett evening (Sunday) on the music-orientated Radio 3 rather than speech-driven Radio 4.

I liked Tom McGurk's infectious enthusiasm for the writer in an interview with Michael Colgan (Today with Tom McGurk, RTÉ Radio 1, Tuesday), but could have done without his oily encomium for the station's "marvellous" efforts to mark the writer's centenary.

As usual, the Easter break saw many of RTÉ's top names disappear on holiday, to be replaced by second-string presenters (not to mention second-string radio reviewers). Only barristers, TDs and Brendan Drumm's "value for money" advisers seem to have more time off than Montrose's finest, although at least Ryan Tubridy deigned to stay with us for Holy Week.

It's still hard to know who The Tubridy Show (RTÉ Radio 1, Monday to Friday) is aimed at, though increasingly the programme seems to have an urban, young-professional orientation. Notwithstanding that, the "king of witter" ran an engaging hour of chat with a roomful of energetic sixtysomethings on Monday that showed his skill in working a crowd of any age.

Call me cynical, but hearing politicians fronting advertisements for charities leaves me queasy. Currently, radio listeners can hear Fine Gael MEP Mairéad McGuinness appealing for women to run the mini-marathon on behalf of Bóthar, while Senator Mary Henry does the honours for the Irish Heart Foundation.

Now don't get me wrong - McGuinness and Henry have every right to do voiceovers for charitable causes. McGuinness is a former agricultural journalist and Bóthar is an agricultural charity, while Henry is a doctor, so there is a logical fit. Yet there's something unsettling about politicians garnering publicity from heart-tugging appeals for poor Africans or patients awaiting transplants. They wouldn't be allowed advertise for political purposes, yet somehow they slip through the net to reach prime time audiences. Isn't it time someone shouted stop?