RTE 1: 'Today' with Claire Byrne

RoscommonHero

Government rewarding RTE despite their pay scandal is already paying dividends. PBH doing their bidding there even moreso than Claire Byrne would.

He seems awfully worried immigrants will be housed close to where the likes of him and his well-to-do, well-spoken, well-educated, well-bred neighbours live.

zell12

I'll SHOUT you down if you ShOUT me down

Ceirseach

PBH showed his middle class bias in that interview. Well-off areas have avoided having IPAs, Homeless people, Travellers and Roma in their communities for decades.

He came across as pro-status quo and was way off being impartial. I'm hugely disappointed in him following that bullying approach to a guest, albeit one as smart as ML.

I'm not a fan of ML/SF policies generally, but she was spot-on this time.

jonniebgood1

She came across as unable to defend the policy. So she tried to attack him for doing his job!!!

Shelga

Neither of them came across well. He was snobby and pompous; she was unable to answer fairly basic questions on cost.

SpaceTrucker

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122419616#Comment_122419616

That sums it up alright. The new SF policy is ridiculous, PBH disgraced himself once again, Government and RTE getting exactly what they both wanted from the new funding model, everyone else screwed….

Bobson Dugnutt

McDonald going on about rudeness and snark is the very height of irony.

Losty Dublin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122419317#Comment_122419317

She ought to sue.

jhansynk10

The truth is all parties are going to deflect and argue around the corners because the migration pact ties the states hands and it doesn't have say around numbers.

thesandeman

He's talking over the Nuacht now 🤣.

hotmail.com

I've not heard Roderic O'Gorman getting a rough interview over the tents fiasco.

padd b1975

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122419616#Comment_122419616

An accurate assessment.

Bellbottoms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122419702#Comment_122419702

Most politicians will try and argue their case without making personal attacks on the interviewer.

This is something she does a lot. I remember her making personal attacks on MM last election.

Something I find deeply unpleasent about Mary Lou.

Bellbottoms

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122419658#Comment_122419658

LOL.

padd b1975

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122420677#Comment_122420677

Sure sign of someone under pressure.

Playing the man, not the ball.

zell12

"First of all, I have to say your tone with me in this interview is extremely rude. But be that as it may, the Government may claim that this is their approach…

I'm less interested - and I would have thought that as a journalist and a broadcaster, you would be far more inquisitive - around what the Government is saying …

I will listen with interest, Philip, (to you) and to your colleagues, when you have others setting out policy proposals, a similar demand for exact costings, line by line. That's not what policy documents and position papers do, and you really should know that."

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/extremely-rude-says-mary-lou-mcdonald-in-heated-row-with-rtes-philip-boucher-hayes-as-she-defends-sinn-fein-migration-policy/a1880230873.html

meow

Arghus

I could see how his tone could get under your skin, but, she was pretty damn prickly - felt she played the man and not the ball on a few occasions.

The questions he was asking about costs etc were robust, but weren't outrageous - considering they were happy enough to take all the publicity yesterday when they launched the policy.

You've got to expect pushback from people asking how the policy will be implemented in reality.

Some of her commentary was very petty: implying that he couldn't understand the policy, that no other politician would be expected to know the costings of a policy - the very thing she was on the show to talk about.

And some of what she said saying seemed to make no literally no sense. She seemed to be arguing at one point that because they're the opposition they shouldn't have total understanding or command of their own policy proposals.

Whatever about PBH being a bit pompous - which he can be - I thought ML came out of it quite badly.

thesandeman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122421041#Comment_122421041

I found myself reading that in a Mary Lou voice 😂.

I would tend to lean towards SF on a lot of things but I think she was in the wrong this morning.

I really do think she wasn't prepared to be faced with PBH. She sounded very flustered from the start. I wouldn't be at all surprised if she had just been asked to appear on "the Claire Byrne show" and hadn't realised Claire was away.

amlinopta

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122421706#Comment_122421706

I think she probably wasn’t expecting him. Listening back to the intro, he said good morning to her and addressed her by name. She just said ‘good morning’, no Phillip, sounded like she was caught on the hop.

Bobson Dugnutt

"Your tone is antagonistic and you're making me very angry”

Arghus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122421773#Comment_122421773

I suppose there's a danger of going too deep with the analysis, but, yeah, I think you're onto something there.

There was a few other little small details too: the lousy phone line she was on, the little cough she had at one point. It's not inconceivable that she wasn't in the best of form. You'd be used to hearing ML being combative in interviews, but I can't recall her being so tetchy, snarky and downright childish. It was an unusually bad humoured performance.

I think PBH actually did alright you know in some ways. Whenever she had a go at him personally, he largely didn't fight back and just let her words sit, which kinda drew attention to their unusual level of saltiness.

All in all, a bit of a car crash.

robo

Is it time for Mary Lou to do the same as Leo & Eammon - step down as leader, she can be amazing at debating but like Gerry, she doesn't always have the facts and figures that Eoin and Pearse can stand over. I would find PBH a bit condescending at times, and I used to enjoy Country Wide but I just can't listen to it with him on it.

But back to Mary Lou - like FG and Greens - SF need a fresh voice and one from someone who knows where they stand on things like riots etc. I'd say it gets samey being in the opposition all your life & going on how SF did in the last elections, got it wrong on the referendum, they need a new leader and new vision if they ever wanna lead the country.

Bobson Dugnutt

Pearse Doherty has a terrible grasp of detail and figures. He’s all fake outrage and sound bites.

robo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122423453#Comment_122423453

Yeh true too - but SF definitely need fresh voices on the radio that know what they are talking about and can stand over their facts and figures. Otherwise the PHB roasting ML got won't be the only one.

squonk

Unfortunately for SF and, in particular, Mary Lou is the leader of the primary opposition party now. I’m sure it’s great being seen as the main opposition however you have to be prepared to have your policies examined in depth. I suspect the SD leader or Labour leader might not have gotten quite the in-depth analysis from anyone but they’re not going to be heading a government anytime soon and will be, if anything, a coalition partner with focus on certain areas. Having an in-depth interview shouldn’t have come as a surprise.

MLD is a liability at this stage. He off the ball tactics of getting litigious with anyone who has a critique she doesn’t like isn’t a good look for a najor party leader. Her behaviour with PBH yesterday was just an extension of this. She comes across as someone well able to dish it out but really unable to take it themselves and that’s a very bad look.

The SF problem though is that she’s almost the only show in town for now. They don’t really have a huge depth of people with experience and ability in the ranks for now. I’m sure that’ll change in the coming years but not just yet.

zell12

If SF had a charismatic leader who knew how to talk, they'd have a majority in the Dáil. So many easy targets with our current Govt

Shelga

She may have a point at times about such robust questioning not being applied to members of the government (although I’m sure RTÉ presenters would absolutely refute this), but if you throw that out in a defensive manner when you clearly don’t have answers on cost for a fairly major policy, you’re going to look petty and childish. It shouldn’t matter how smug that git Boucher-Hayes was being. A good leader rises above that.

She may just have been having an off day and we’re all only human, but the whole interview did not reflect well on either of them.

Agree with the poster who said that if she’s serious about being in government, she needs to respond in the manner of a would-be Taoiseach, and yesterday’s interview was very far removed from that.

tohaltuwi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122419658#Comment_122419658

Be careful what you wish for, Mary Lou/Sinn Féin have a generous legal wallet 😉

tohaltuwi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122423695#Comment_122423695

Their “policies” stand on feet of clay . Just trying to appeal to old original base with no more substance than mere sound-bites-a d a tantrum response to any questioning. And she lives in a luxury home and came from a very fine address originally, attended my own very pleasant small private school. She’s far removed from her original voter base but speaks plainly enough in an effort to sound like she had a lower middle class upbringing.

squonk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122423781#Comment_122423781

This exactly. Had she facts to have, she should have iterated through those and reiterated if she felt PBH wasn’t getting it or was somehow misrepresenting the policy.

You only have to look at the Friday gathering where government reps are subjected to a free for all on whatever policies make the news this week. It can get heated but more often than not the rep remains calm but fights their corner.

As a leader you can’t just get pissy if you don’t like the questions. If you feel an interviewer is biased or is out to misrepresent you, just blind them with the facts and clear up the issues. That makes the interviewer look like the ass they are. MLD got pissy but PBH stuck to the facts. The roles were reversed. It’s a very poor showing.