A Failure To Debate

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00118671Newstalk

Newstalk listener Brendan McCafferty complained to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland about comments made by  the station’s Breakfast Show’s presenters in relation to Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s decision not to participate in a public debate on the referendum to abolish the Seanad.

Mr McCafferty complained the presenters compared Mr Kenny to Chairman of the Communist Party of China, Mao Zedong and did not give an alternative view based on facts.

Mr McCafferty claimed the presenters ‘should have known that no Taoiseach ever takes part in such debates outside of general election time and, in fact, there is much precedent for this stand by An Taoiseach’.

Mr McCafferty claimed the presenters lacked impartiality and balance.

Newstalk responded saying previous Taoisigh did debate matters outside of general elections, including former Fine Gael Taoiseach, John Bruton, who debated the 1996 divorce referendum on RTÉ’s ‘This Week’ and in several radio interviews, and fellow former Fine Gael Taoiseach Garrett Fitzgerald, who debated a previous divorce referendum in 1986 on RTE’s Today Tonight.

However, the BAI decided to uphold part of Mr McCafferty’s complaint.

It decided:

“The Committee was of the opinion that other perspectives on the decision of An Taoiseach Enda Kenny not to participate in media debates were not provided. Further, the Committee found that the presenters made a number of comments that should have rightly been balanced by other perspectives. These included comments on the decision of An Taoiseach not to participate in a television debate, as well as the broader media communications decisions of An Taoiseach, as being akin to those of Mao Zedong.”

“In view of the above, the Committee found that the programme discussion failed to meet the requirements of the BAI Code of Fairness, Objectivity and Impartiality in News and Current Affairs and the complaint has been upheld in part further to Section 4.1 of this Code.”

DEBATE! Fight!

Read the complaint and decision in full here

(Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland)

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