An era has come to an end with the retirement of Joe Duffy from Liveline. In a medium where presenters tend to come and go, his 27-year stint in the job was remarkable. “Talk to Joe”, that familiar voice intoned. And talk to Joe we did. About all manner of issues, from the most trivial to the most important social concerns. Liveline, initially presented by the late Marian Finucane, grew into a quintessentially Irish mix of light and shade – everything from uproar over the sex in Normal People to harrowing tales of the victims of institutional abuse and the moving stories of the children killed during the 1916 Rising.
While Joe’s show had its funny moments – its listeners showed an inexhaustible ability to find new and strange things to complain about – its real importance was in giving a voice to people who did not have one. And if something broke through thanks to the Liveline loudspeaker, people in power were forced to listen – and to act.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin, in a contribution to Duffy’s final show yesterday, spoke of how civil servants would often come running in to his office shouting: “Liveline’s gone mad, we’ve got to do this, that and the other”. It should not take a radio show to get “the system” to respond to the needs of ordinary people. But all too often it does.
In the early decades after independence, Irish radio played an important role in shaping modern Ireland’s developing national identity. In more recent decades, shows such as those presented by Gay Byrne, Marian Finucane and Joe Duffy have themselves been conduits for, and participants in, the evolving national conversation in a country undergoing dramatic change and upheaval.
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Just as the Late Late Show in its heyday was far more than light entertainment, these radio shows had a social and sometimes political importance that went far beyond their ostensible function as daytime talk radio. In an age when radio and television are challenged by technological change and profound shifts in how people stay informed, Liveline’s enduring power is a real achievement.
