MORNING Ireland hit the ground running on Friday with a brisk, informative and balanced round up of consumer and producer reaction to the BSE crisis. Then it stumbled and fell on a silly bit of froth from Geraldine Harney about Arnotts, presumably inspired by that company's 20 per cent jump in pre tax profits. In an effort to explain their success, someone from Arnotts told us that "the more mature woman" shops at Boyers, which is owned by Arnotts.
The sub text of his comments was clear sound, sensible women go to Boyers, where they are free of the subversive exuberances women let off their leash indulge in elsewhere. Harney seemed to find this kind of sexist nonsense great crack, judging by her response, but this listener was left feeling insulted and perplexed.
What's going on here? Is this meant to be a business report? If 50, where are the facts, the probing questions, the analysis? If not, what editorial approach justifies giving a company the chance to plug itself unashamedly on what is meant to be a top current affairs programme?
Over on Raidio na Gaeltachta, meanwhile, the morning current affairs programme carried no dubious business reports, just solid reporting. This included an item on the drugs problem in Dingle, official recognition for a gaelscoil in Belfast, and a phone interview with a Welsh journalist on the collapse in consumer confidence in beef.
The interview covered some aspects of the crisis I didn't hear discussed elsewhere on RTE, and other programmes later in the day followed suit. This writer has been a trenchant critic of Raidio na Gaeltachta in the past, so it's good to be able to acknowledge its strengths. There are also indications that the station is trying to tackle some of its deep rooted problems, but more of that anon.
Back on Morning Ireland there was a lot more beef stew, with the Rathkeale fraud case and the beef fine to remind us of what Paddy McEntee described in court as "slipshod practices" and "corner cutting" in the industry. Fintan O'Toole brought us back to 1991, when it seemed Russia might collapse into famine and chaos. In an effort to stabilise things, a worried EU decided to ship out prime cuts of Irish beef, but somewhere along the way green hearts and other bits and bobs were slipped into the mix. This was a particularly obscene act, given our own history.
Despite this kind of track record, the airwaves last week were filled with a succession of ministers, farming representatives and others bent on telling us how wonderful, green (that word again) and healthy Irish beef is. On the News at One on Friday Ivan Yates dismissed the bad image of the beef industry as "a lot of media hype". John Donnelly of the IFA told us that "now is not the time" to talk about past troubles.
Later in the day An Bord Bia ran a hamfisted ad boasting that Irish beef is the best in the world. John Bruton told us on Today at Five that Irish beef was "BSE free". And so on with this onslaught, RTE, most of the media, simply. In a conflict between a vital national interest and consumers, the interests of the consumer were mostly left far behind, at least on news programmes.
But Irish consumers don't live in banana republic anymore, where what el presidente says goes. They live in a sophisticated democracy and can make up their own minds. Irish beef is not BSE free and Mr Bruton must know that, and telling lies is not going to convince people to start eating beef again.
By and large, RTE journalists failed to challenge ministers and the Taoiseach sufficiently hard on their statements, assertions and assumptions. It was a war situation, and, as always, the first casualty was truth.
Ironically, in a bad week for journalism, RTE's excellent Farm News kept a cool head. It reported on Friday that many farmers were deliberately keeping milk in storage until after April 1st, in order to escape milk quota penalties. Makes you wonder how "fresh" the milk you pour on your corn flakes tomorrow will be.
And an elderly gentleman from Ceathru Thaidhg in Mayo told Seo Mhaigh Eo on Raidio na Gaeltachta about the days of his youth, when the sea was teeming with fish, basking sharks and porpoises, and the only fertiliser was seaweed dragged up from the beach and the odd bit of dung. Asked what he thought about the constant reassurances from Dublin about Irish beef, his reply was succint: "Is iomai rud a deirtear."
Aye, surely, `tis many the thing is said.
