For Peter Feeney the countdown to the millennium has become a reality of everyday life. He has just been appointed to a position that will not become vacant again for another 1000 years - RTE's head of Millennium and Special Programmes.
Feeney, the outgoing editor of E's current affairs, will be in charge of co-ordinating E's the station's response to both the end of the millennium and the century. Given RTE's central position in the cultural life of Ireland, his decisions will shape to a major extent how we look back, and also, as he is keen to emphasise, look forward to the 21st century.
After being editor of current affairs, being head of millennium programmes might seem like a step backwards, but he says he looks forward to the opportunity of being able to view something in the long term, increasingly a rare facility in any media area. In current affairs he had two, three or four deadlines a week. Now he has about an 18-month lead-in time, with most of the programmes being screened in 1999.
Programmes will come from three sources, from RTE itself, from the independent production sector and from abroad.
Millennium programmes might strike horror into the hearts of most television viewers, a sort of New Year's Eve writ large. Feeney is aware of how boring millennium programmes could be. But that need not be the case, he insists. Using the millennium or the centenary gives opportunities to examine 1000 years of music, for instance, or different types of music. It can the basis for quiz shows and other programmes.
The managing director of television, Mr Joe Mulholland, said last week that RTE will attempt to strike a balance between a celebration of what has been achieved and a recognition of the human price that has often been paid for that achievement. Feeney agrees and says he will be investigating ways that programmes can look at environmental issues, for instance, possibly through an environmental audit, to see what we are handing on to the 21st century. Talks are taking place with BBC Scotland and BBC Wales for jointly produced programmes looking at aspects of the Celts, the Celtic manuscripts, and the movement of Celtic peoples over the past 1000 years. Sean O Mordha is producing a series with BBC Northern Ireland on the history of the Irish Republic since 1922.
It will be an opportunity to see how Ireland has contributed and what that contribution has been. While a vast amount of material will be available on the worldwide television markets, Feeney's job will be to ensure that Ireland is included and that RTE's response is more than a chronological approach.
Peter Feeney joined RTE in 1975, after a brief career teaching politics at the University of Ulster. He was appointed editor of current affairs in 1990. It was a period of intense change, with almost daily live current affairs programming in Today Tonight being replaced by Prime Time and other current affairs strands.
The new programmes, which included the documentary series, Tuesday File, as well as Questions and Answers, were criticised for offering a softer response to political debate. RTE's current affairs department, it was said, would ensure that the station would never respond the way it did during the 1989 election. It identified health as a major issue, and went after it every night. Many in Fianna Fail blamed RTE for its failure to secure a majority.
Subsequently Fianna Fail did not favour RTE in terms of legislation, Feeney says with some understatement. It brought in the infamous cap on its income. However, from where Feeney was sitting, in charge of RTE's current affairs, no one government exerted more pressure than another. There were complaints and pressures, but no direct government attempts to stop programmes.
The changes in RTE's current affairs, he insists, were a response to the changing nature of news and how it was covered. There was a huge growth in the amount of news and the idea of nightly blanket coverage was outdated. As RTE television is the sole outlet for domestic debate on television, there will and should be tension between politicians and the broadcasters, he says. With other media, such as radio and newspapers, there are alternatives. A low point for Feeney as head of current affairs was the Patrick Tuffy programme. It was cleared by lawyers, and the former minister, Mr Michael Lowry, was never identified as the minister responsible for the letters mentioned. Everything seemed fine until Mr Lowry's name was given on Morning Ireland and then Mr Tuffy denied everything, "and everything unravelled".
The high point was the last general election, securing the leaders' debates and covering the election with reports and analysis fairly and accurately. It was an election in which television played an important role. At the end there were virtually no complaints from the parties.
The presidential election will be very different to previous elections, he suggests. The mould has been broken. There is only one politician in the race. It will be absolutely necessary for candidates to secure as much access to television as possible, so that the voters get to know them, as they have little record to go on. In the meantime, as we look towards polling day at the end of next month, Peter Feeney looks towards New Year's Eve, 1999. Yes, RTE will be marking the millennium in 2000, not 2001.