RADIO REVIEW:THERE WAS a time when broadcast journalists were reluctant to give their opinion. Gay Byrne was a conduit for social change, but he gave his sparingly. These days, however, even veteran broadcasters are all about giving their thr'pence worth.
"This is economic sabotage!" Gareth O'Callaghan said on Tuesday's Breakfast On 4(4FM, weekdays) of the 10,500-strong nationwide electricians strike. That was directed at Pat Guilfoyle, regional secretary of the Technical, Engineering and Electrical Union. "This is money that's due to us," Guilfoyle replied.
“As I’m listening to you, 3,000 people a week are joining the social welfare queues,” O’Callaghan said. “Every business needs an electrician. Every business needs an engineer. This is pure greed.” This was just sticks and stones and fibre-optic cables to Guilfoyle. “The greed is on the side of the employers,” he said. “You do not have the support of the people,” O’Callaghan said, trying again. “We have the support of the workers,” Guilfoyle replied. “. . . who have jobs,” O’Callaghan added.
Anne-Marie Power's Documentary On One: The Day they Became Men – How the Story Changes(RTÉ Radio One, Saturday) is worth a listen back online. It traced rugby from the 1970s to its lucrative, professional status today, charting the tribal rivalry between Munster ruffians and Leinster pretty boys, but it was also a story of Ireland's emerging middle class.
The opinion-heavy opening monologue on The Gerry Ryan Show(2FM, weekdays) goes on long enough to make me yearn for those five magic words, "The Ryan Line is open!" On Wednesday, he spoke to Jason O'Toole, author of Crime Ink: Interviews with Notorious Criminals and Other Notes from the Irish Underground. Alas, they portrayed these men as enigmatic figures full of supposedly fascinating and surprising contradictions. Ryan even likened John Gilligan to Al Capone.
O’Toole interviewed the late Patrick “Dutchy” Holland (right) in London’s Wormwood Scrubs Prison last summer. “He was the only criminal in the book who didn’t use bad language,” O’Toole said. “He was an extremely religious man, that took me aback, he went to Mass every day.” Attending Mass to look good is not just the preserve of ordinary decent criminals.
“I asked him about his [late] wife and had he any regrets in life and he actually started to cry,” O’Toole added, stopping dead for Ryan’s reaction or maybe pausing for dramatic effect. “I couldn’t believe it. It took me aback.” Again? “I’d never seen a criminal cry before.”
Of John Gilligan, O’Toole said, “I was very nervous going into the prison to meet him. He put me at ease straight away . . . He just walked in and said, ‘How’s it going, Jason?’ and the way he shook my hand he was really like a politician.”
Since school is out for politicians for the summer, Ivan Yates on Thursday's The Breakfast Show(Newstalk 106-108, weekdays) asked Fianna Fáil's Mary O'Rourke and Fine Gael's Leo Varadkar to mark the report cards of members of the opposition. It proved an interesting after-school exercise.
He asked O’Rourke how she rated Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny. “He’s like a preacher,” O’Rourke said, “standing there with fire in his eyes.”
“For doggedness,” O’Rourke continued, “I would pick out Richard Bruton. He is quite put together. Leo Varadkar is the same.” She named Fine Gael’s Michael Ring as best heckler and Fine Gael’s Lucinda Creighton as the brightest. “She is composed and confident, young and female.”
Of those who he thinks have done very well “partly because they’ve been able to get away with murder” (for their respective cutbacks) Varadkar chose Minister for Social and Family Affairs Mary Hanafin and Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan, “who started off very roughly in finance” but who he said has improved.
Varadkar picked Fianna Fáil’s Martin Mansergh as best heckler. (He does have some class of fire in his belly.) For the brightest sparks, he picked Fianna Fáil’s Dara Calleary and Chris Andrews. It was a fun game, which made a change from the usual point-scoring, though it was strange that Labour didn’t get a look-in.
qfottrell@irishtimes.com