Gender Imbalance Continues to be an issue at 2FM in 2021

 

In July 2013 Darragh McManus in his Radio Column in the Irish Independent[1] wrote, when it was announced that Louise McSharry would temporarily replace Ryan Tubridy on 2 FM,

‘It’s a big deal because Louise McSharry as you will have gathered from the name, is female. And 2FM is almost entirely a female free zone. Out of the roughly 20 shows in a normal week three are hosted by females (one co-hosting with a man). None are anywhere near primetime.’

He added,

‘The fact that taxpayers fund 2FM – and half are women- seems to make it worse’.

2013

Half those taxpayers by inference are therefore men and are entitled to equal representation on the 2FM airwaves, gender equality. The issue now is the under representation of the male voice as presenters/DJs on the national pop channel and reverse inequality. As of March 25^th 2021, this was the line up on 2FM,

6am             Doireann Garrihy

9am             Jennifer Zamperelli

12 Noon      Tracy Clifford

3pm             Jenny Greene

6pm             Game on Presented by Marie Crowe (with Ruby Walsh & Donnacha O’Callaghan)

7pm             Tara Stewart

10pm           Dan Hegarty

News          Jan O’Connell

But how far has equality come and now surpassed itself on the national airwaves. By 2014, a Women on the Air conference claimed only 25% of voices on Irish airwaves were female. Jenny Greene at the time said,

‘a woman should only be allowed on the air if she is good enough’.

 Fellow broadcaster Alison Curtis who works as the national commercial station Today FM said,

‘I don’t think you should put somebody on based on their gender, we need to divide the talent equally but put the best on the air’.[2]

In 2017, the journal.ie in an article titled ‘'You won't hear a woman's voice, and it's not acceptable': What are Irish radio stations doing about gender balance?

They reported,

‘Fierce discussion has been taking place about gender balance in Irish radio, after it emerged this month that two of the country’s most high-profile stations, Today FM and Newstalk (part of the Communicorp stable), do not have any women on air during peak listening times of 7am – 7pm.’

In 2018, The National Women’s Council of Ireland (NWCI) asked the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) to monitor the Irish airwaves for gender balance on a yearly basis but the emphasis seemed to only focus on gender balance as it affected women not male broadcasters.

As of March 2021, from 6am to Midnight, only 11% of on air voices as male, a different gender imbalance. It may absolutely be the case that only the best should be heard on air, those most popular with listeners.  This has to be balanced with the JNLR figures in November 2020 which saw 2FM lose listeners and Newstalk becoming the second most listened to station Nationwide[3].

 

Much has been made of gender equality in the workplace over the past decade and major strides have been made in numerous male dominated industries. There has been an improved balance with the Irish radio industry but just as the campaign to gain greater acceptance of female recognition and opportunities, the same must now be applied to the gender imbalance against the males in the industry. Gender disparity in favour of female presenters is not gender equality. The gender equality that RTE DG Dee Forbes said she would address[4] when she was appointed in April 2016 has yet to find a balance.

---

[1] Page 89 Irish Independent 27^th July 2013

[2] Interview with Woman’s Way Magazine

[3] https://radiotoday.ie/2020/11/a-boost-for-newstalk-in-the-latest-jnlr-results/

[4] Sunday Independent April 3^rd 2016

A St. Patrick's Day Pirate Radio Throwback

Over the decades Irish pirate radio stations have garnered newspaper headlines for their antics in and around St. Patrick's Day. Here is a small selection of those headlines. 

In 1978, Radio Dublin announced it would be taking part in the iconic St Patrick's Day parade, but just a couple of days later...

In 1979, unlike Dublin, Radio Cill Dara takes part in the local St Patrick's Day parade in Newbridge.

One station that launched on a St. Patrick's Day was Centre Radio in Clonmel in 1986. 

and finally back to where we started with Radio Dublin who would suffer with their FM Frequency woes when Radio Ireland, who had won the national radio franchise following the demise of Century FM, would officially go on air on St Patrick's Day. 

 

Pictures of the Actual Equipment & Aerials used by the 1916 Rebels to Broadcast to the World

 

In the early 1990’s I read Maurice Gorham’s book ’40 Years of Irish Radio’ and after a couple of pages I came across the startling discovery for me that the rebels during the 1916 Easter Rising ‘broadcast to the world’. I thought,

‘why are we not celebrating this unique historical fact more?’I began to research the subject slowly to find out if it was, as some history books put it ‘a happenchance event’ or that it could not be really described as a radio station as no one had heard these broadcasts. In an old Jackdaw publication from the 1970’s, that my parents had bought me as a birthday present’ was many facsimiles of documents relating to the Rising and one of those was a signed order from James Connolly ‘to protect our wireless station’.

For the next twenty-five years when work and family time allowed me, I continued to research the subject and the picture emerged of a truly historical event, that Ireland became the first nation in the world to be declared by radio. The culmination of that research was my 2016 book ‘Rebel Radio’ published by Kilmainham Tales Teo. It sold extremely well, and it led to the commemoration of the rebel broadcasts erected at the site of station, now the Grand Central Bar on the corner of O’Connell Street and Middle Abbey Street.

Since the publication more information has come to light of both the scope and success of the station and I want to share some of it here with more appearing in the next edition of the book due out in 2022.

First are pictures of the actual aerials and equipment that was used by rebels in 1916 and taken in the rooms that the rebels seized in April 1916. These pictures were taken when the Irish School of Wireless Telegraphy originally opened in March 1913 as a subsidiary of the Northern Wireless School, that was based at 47 Market Street, Manchester. Photographed sitting at the table in front of the receiver in the station is the School’s chief instructor when it opened A. P. Corcoran, a former Naval Marconi wireless officer. We know that this was the equipment used by the Rebels as the school was closed by the British authorities in 1914 under the Defense of the Realm Act as the War broke out. The British fearful that the equipment would be used to contact the Germans. 

AP Corcoran behind the desk in the Wireless School on the top floor of Reis's Chambers

The aerials on the roof of Reis's Chambers. Taken down after the enforced closure at the beginning of the First World War. They were left on the roof and partially re-erected by the rebels including John Blimey O'Connor and Fergus O'Kelly to allow the rebel broadcasts. 

 In the aftermath of the Rising and Reis’s Chambers completely destroyed where the rebels had broadcast from, the Marconi Company who had leased the equipment to station owner Phillip Keston Turner (later to be one half of the duo who invented Hi Fi), claimed for damages for the loss of the equipment used to run the Wireless School.

For any radio stations listeners as a valuable commodity. In the book we already discovered that the rebel station was heard by the wireless operator on board HMS Adventure, the journalist Sidney Cave and an amateur wireless operator in Wales. This letter that appeared in the Irish Times in March 1961 written by J G Reid, reveals that the station’s broadcasts were also picked up by the wireless operators at the Naval wireless station in Skerries.

Longford Pirate Radio post 1988

 

What was described as a golden era of Irish pirate radio came to an end on December 31^st 1988. Longford had seen its fair share of pirate radio activity throughout the 1980’s but the introduction of the 1988 Wireless Telegraphy Act did not silence pirate radio activity in the county of Longford. From 2000 onwards until increased Comreg activity in the area, there was increased illegal broadcasting activity. A number of stations battled on the pages of the Longford Leader rather than over the airwaves. One in particular Big LCR, the brainchild of Paddy Farrell, is covered here on the pirate archive website radiowaves.fm, including his court appearance following a ComReg/Garda raid on his station.

(c) Longford Leader 2002

In 2000, a number of stations claimed that they were broadcasting in Longford including Tilt FM, Sham FM and the aforementioned Big LCR.

The increased activity in the Longford area brought unwanted attention on some of the Catholic churches in the county who were broadcasting on FM.

But by illegal parish broadcasts did return to the airwaves including Ardagh on 108mhz FM.

(c) Longford Leader 2020

Sources:

The Longford Leader Newspaper

The Longford News 

www.radiowaves.fm

The Irish Pirate Radio Archive

The DX Archive