Ladies and Gentlemen,
This is the point where I’m supposed to say I’m delighted to be here.
But as I look around me I wonder if I can truthfully say that.
Because there’s a little-known natural law which says politicians, particularly when they’re in Government, have to hate media, and that media have to hate politicians, especially when those politicians are in Government.
So I couldn’t really be delighted to be here. Could I?
Except that there’s another little-known natural law in this area.
That’s the law which holds that politicians like the company of journalists more than they like the company of any other single group. And vice versa.
I know it’s contradictory, but that’s life.
Many of you will be aware that Ben Bradley the man who edited The Washington Post, was a close personal friend of John F. Kennedy when Kennedy was US President. He’s written about the friendship. His book underlines the natural affinity politicians and newsmen and women have for each other.
But it also underlines the danger of politicians and newspeople getting too close to each other. Bradley, while serving as an active journalist, effectively also served as an unpaid advisor to Kennedy.
Kennedy discussed policy-in-the-making with Bradley. He gave him scoops. But most of all, he gave Bradley the incredible flattery of knowing he was close to the leader of one of the two great powers of the day.
Don’t tell me that Kennedy didn’t get more positive coverage as a result.
And don’t tell me that’s a good model of approach.
It’s a very tempting model of approach. From both sides. But I would suggest that a decent distance between the two professions benefits both.
Politicians need to constantly examine how they see media. One problem TDs and Senators have is that they move within a sort of media sub-culture: political correspondents, Dail correspondents, and in the case of Ministers the correspondents dealing with their particular portfolio. In that situation, the view of a politician can become narrowed and capital-centric.
Not a good thing.
Nor is it a good thing to lump all journalists from print and electronic outlets into one big mass: the media. It’s a form of categorization we in politics need to be wary of: lumping individuals into a dislikeable mass is never a good thing.
Which brings me to what makes radio news separate and different.
First of all, let’s look at what makes radio itself different.
TV is like Hallowe’en: fireworks and sweets and nutcrackers and witches, demons and angels.
Radio doesn’t have any of that flashbang stuff, but as a result is a much better medium if you want to help people understand something complex, if you want to change ideas and prejudices, if you want to involve individuals in a real way in an issue.
We tend to listen to radio on our own, whereas TV is still a reasonably communal medium, three or four people watching in the sitting-room. That’s changing, but a TV in every room isn’t yet the norm.
Listening in the kitchen or the car, it’s as if the person on the radio is talking to you personally. I find, travelling to Dublin each morning, that my local station, LMFM briefs me better than any printed material I could be given.
Which brings me to an odd problem. The word ‘local.’ Apply the word ‘local’ to radio and it tends to lessen its importance, whereas it should actually increase its importance. Particularly when it comes to news, local radio is hugely important.
It’s an aspect of the social capital about which the Taoiseach has spoken so passionately. It’s an offering that centers people within their community while informing them about the world.
I often feel and I hope to be corrected by people here today but I often feel that the work of local radio news journalists is frequently taken for granted.
The upside of that being taken for granted, of course, is that listeners choose local radio news so frequently. Despite the fact that listeners have never had so much choice from at home and abroad, local radio holds its own by being local and at the same time being as professional as the best.
That sense of professionalism is undoubtedly helped by the crisp packaging done by INN in providing national and international news for stations around the country. Any politician sensitive to the value of local radio values the arrangement INN has with the local stations allowing a politician to be interviewed by, say, Highland Radio in Donegal and have their remarks aired on WLR in Waterford within minutes.
It’s vital that this professionalism is registered and protected. What we might call the news animal the local news animal is constantly endangered by predators of various kinds.
One of those predators is commerciality. Murmurings surface now and then about stations here and overseas cutting back on news in favour of guff about celebs, because real hard news isn’t considered as commercial as gossip. In this regard, one of the best instructions to news journalists was given more than 50 years ago in America. William Paley, the founder and chairman of CBS, was famously quoted as telling his correspondents, “You worry about the news. I’ve got Jack Benny to bring in the profits.”
Jack Benny was a famous comedian of the day!
Profits are not the purpose of news. But, on the other hand, people need news. Particularly at times of disaster. They respond to well presented news.
Again, an American example.
Before 9/11, National Public Radio in the States had not quite 15 million listeners a day. That figure shot up to more than 19 million after the attacks, and by the spring of 2004 it had reached 22 million, an increase of 51% in the past four years.
By comparison, the top-rated network television evening news show, the NBC Nightly News, was down to an average of 11.4 million viewers a night in the first week of November 2004. The clear implication is that radio adds value to news which is appreciated by news consumers.
An awful lot of management-speak over the past few years has been about the importance of managing change.
It’s my personal belief that local radio news faces huge challenges in this area.
- There’s the challenge of diversity: some local stations now sit in the middle of a multicultural, multi-ethnic community whose needs, preferences and attitudes have changed radically in an amazingly short period of time.
- There’s the challenge of impartiality: all local radio newsdesks run into the same pressures national newsdesks experience, except in a more ‘up close and personal’ way.
- There’s the challenge of innovation: how do you keep refreshing your offering without trivializing it?
Thus far, local radio news has been a net contributor to Irish life. It enriches the life of individuals, it reinforces the sense of place and of belonging, it alerts local communities to emerging issues, and it mobilizes human concern at times of local tragedy.
I have no doubt that today’s conference, with its line up of formidable and prestigious speakers, will help those working in local radio to achieve even more in future.
And I hope that I’ll be just one of a steadily-growing number of listeners.
Ends