A 1970 episode of the popular RT╔ drama The Riordans was criticised as "nothing short of libellous" because of its portrayal of a Department of Agriculture official.
A civil service union official complained: "The portrayal of 'the Department's man' as a person accustomed to transacting business in public houses and having dubious financial dealings with farmers to whom he is rendering a service on behalf of the government is considered by our members to be nothing short of libellous."
The general secretary of the Institute of Professional Civil Servants, Mr R.B. Pares, expressed concern in a letter to the RT╔ director general, Mr Thomas Hardiman, that the programme was damaging to the status of his members.
Replying, Mr Hardiman said: "You will appreciate that in a long-running serial there must be villains as well as heroes."
Documents released also reveal that, as Tβnaiste and minister for transport and power, Erskine Childers criticised RT╔'s coverage of the oil and mining industries in the late 1960s. He complained to the chairman of the RT╔ Authority, Todd Andrews, that a Seven Days oil programme made his department appear "sleepy" and a mining programme was designed to suggest that the Government had been "deceived".