I do not propose to speak too long on this matter this morning because it has been well and truly discussed. From now on we can simply contemplate the consequences of the Minister's action in sacking the authority. As I was saying, the evidence suggests that the Minister's action was the result of deliberate policy on his part to "get" the authority, to teach the authority and the broadcasting media a lesson. The correspondence released to the Press by the former chairman of RTE would suggest that far from the Minister having to deal with a subversive authority, the members of that authority were at all times conscious of their obligations and the statutory relationship between the authority and the Government. There was no question of their wishing to subvert section 31 of the Broadcasting Act. That section says that the Minister may direct the authority in writing to refrain from broadcasting any particular matter or matter of any particular class and the authority shall comply. There was no denial of the right of the Oireachtas under that section by any member of the authority.
Following the Minister's directive to the authority under that section the authority sought clarification as to which organisations the Minister had in mind and exactly what were to be the limits and extent of the directive. In the words of the former chairman:
We were served on 1st October, 1971 with a vague direction under section 31. We had been asked to do an impossible task not knowing who was to be either judge or jury of our performance and without the right of appeal that other citizens have the privilege of enjoying.
These were the difficulties the former chairman of the authority saw in the vaguely formulated directive of the Minister under section 31. As he says, this letter of the authority looking for clarification of the Minister's intention begot the bland and less than helpful reply that the directive spoke for itself.
That was October of last year. Obviously, that was not the response of a Minister who wished to help a loyal authority, an authority who were not subversive of the institutions of the State but who wished to perform their duties diligently under section 31 of the Broadcasting Act.
The next communication from the Minister was that "RTE had broadcast a programme between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. on Sunday last which was in contravention of the directive of October, 1971." This was precisely the kind of situation the former chairman had feared and about which he had asked help from the Minister, a situation in which the Minister would be both judge and jury, a situation in which the Minister simply said: "My vaguely formulated directive which puzzled you last year now has this result. I am asking you to tell me what action you propose to take as a result of a particular broadcast last Sunday".
This Minister, who was so sparing in his advice, so frugal in comment on the directive, maintained this economy of comment on the situation when it came to that second communication with the authority. He simply wished to know what action the authority proposed to take in relation to the alleged contravention. Exactly what did the Minister mean by that question? Was the Minister suggesting the sacking of Kevin O'Kelly? Is that what lay behind that ambiguous question of the Minister? One is entitled to speculate. The members of the authority were entitled to wonder what lay behind that query of the Minister as to what action the authority proposed to take.
A programme had been broadcast. The Minister said it contravened his directive under section 31 and that he wished to know what action the authority proposed to take. I do not think this kind of correspondence would suggest that the Minister was truly living up to what the Act would appear to suggest should have been the relationship between the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs and the authority. The Act envisaged a partnership in which there would be mutual respect, the Minister having the supreme obligation to be the representative of this Parliament in seeing that section 31 was at all times understood and adhered to and the authority, in the day-to-day running of the affairs of the service being supreme in their area. Of course, no statute can prescribe a working relationship. This must be worked out between the principals. If Deputies ask a question about a particular programme broadcast by RTE we get the quite proper reply that it is a matter of day-to-day routine and one proper for the authority. But here we have a decisive intervention by the Minister after almost a year's silence. It would appear from copies of correspondence that the Minister refused to give the authority either any advice or any clear direction when they sought it. Instead, he left them with this vaguely formulated directive. It would appear that the Minister had decided on a fundamental change of relationship between the Government and the RTE Authority. Indeed, it would appear that the Cabinet, as a matter of high policy, have decided to revert to the pre-1960 position when broadcasting was almost under direct ministerial control.
Although nominally we may have an authority still, it is clear that the authority we have now can be only a mere shadow of the authority who preceded them. The Broadcasting Act still holds but the circumstances of the sacking of the previous authority must leave those who come after them in that much weaker a position. If an employee is fired without being given the opportunity of a hearing and if he is replaced by one who is not perturbed by the circumstances of the departure of that employee, the other person would be referred to in trade union parlance as a scab. The new RTE Authority who are taking over as lackeys of the Minister cannot have any of the content, either the respect or the integrity, of the authority who were displaced. The situation now would suggest that we are reverting to the pre-1960 situation. That is a backward step. Whatever may have been said for direct ministerial control of radio in the pre-1960 period—and it was objected to at the time—it was regarded as a step forward to create a situation in which we had an authority or, in other words, an extension of the control of this House in respect of radio and television. It is stated in section 31 of the Broadcasting Act that this Parliament and the Minister of any particular Government may direct the authority in writing to refrain from broadcasting any particular matter. Of course, in the case of a State radio or television station the final authority must be stated. Matter concerning the setting-up of a station and its funding must rest with this assembly and it was a step forward to have passed an Act whereby we shared this particular authority with a group of prominent citizens outside and they, in effect, assumed the day-to-day running of the broadcasting service. This indicated an advance to a new and mature relationship. It indicated a trust in that the State could have a freer broadcasting and television service. A democracy can be classified by the kind of relationship that the central authority enjoy with the broadcasting authority.
We all know of countries that fight colonial wars in the name of liberty and when any such war is over we find that the former revolutionaries control broadcasting very firmly. Here we have a democracy of almost 50 years standing but which has now resorted to methods that belong more properly to peoples and nations only emerging from the consequences of recent war and who find it necessary, for one reason or another of State, to control the broadcasting media. We appear to be joining that league of countries in our treatment of the authority.
This Government have proved themselves consistently insensitive to the 32-county dimensions of any of their political attitudes. The sacking of the authority is a notable instance of that insensitivity. The truth of that can be gauged from the reaction of every member of the SDLP last weekend when they condemned the action of the Government in regard to the authority. They were dismayed by the treatment that the Government had meted out to the authority. They said that it would have adverse effects on their own struggle for a peaceful reunification of the country. But, then, this was the same Government that had first announced a threat of internment without trial on this island in recent times, the same Government who tried to abolish PR. To say the least, they have been insensitive to the repercussions of their actions in the northern part of the country. Even that well known champion of liberty, Captain Brooke, has been shocked by this action in Dublin. I wonder what is the opinion of that section of international liberal opinion which the Taoiseach has been at pains to cultivate in recent years. There have been Sorenson-like speeches echoing around the world as the Taoiseach addressed this international community of liberal thought. Admittedly, the Taoiseach has sent the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs during the past few days to explain to the British public why the firing of the authority had been necessary. I understand the Minister explained that he was not in favour of political censorship although his actions would smack of such censorship in so far as that section of international liberal opinion are concerned.
There have been editorials in the British Press expressing criticism of the Government's action. The Taoiseach and the Government as a whole have been anxious to point out that while there is a healthy democracy in this part of the country there is anarchy in the northern part which has arisen from the unfair distribution of power in that area for so long. The Government's action would not suggest that we acted in a democratic way. Indeed, it would not suggest that we were very confident in the health of democracy in our part of the country. It is very important that in these dangerous days we demonstrate that we are confident in our democratic institutions, that we are not panicked into silly measures, that if we are faced with threats by subversive organisations, by anti-democratic organisations, we will be careful that our cure does not outrival the disease. It would appear on the evidence of correspondence between the chairman of the RTE Authority, the members of that authority and the Minister that the Minister deliberately stalked, deliberately trapped and deliberately fired the authority. That sequence of events and that deliberate intention on the part of the Government seems to suggest themselves to any impartial reader of the correspondence between the chairman of the authority and the Minister.
Mrs. Phyllis O'Kelly, a former member of the authority, said the government had bubbled over. Indeed they had. The consequences of that action is that we have an authority with no real life of its own. Whatever the Act may say the authority has no real authority and the consequences of this loss of face must extend into the minds and the work of all the people working in the television station. I recall the scene in King Lear where the servant and the fool meet Lear on the moor. He is in disgrace, out of his court and is unrecognisable in his adversity. Lear says: “How exactly do you recognise me?” This is the substance of the actual dialogue. The fool says: “Thou hast that in thy countenance which I would fain call master”. Lear says: “What is that?” He replies: “Authority”. That is what is absent here as a result of the Minister's action.
The statute may still be as clear as ever on the books but the people who now call themselves members of the RTE Authority lack the real content of any moral authority. They are Minister's men replacing people who were sacked unceremoniously and without adequate explanation by the Minister. We have not lacked such people in the previous history of this country. Obviously there is a full supply of them for the Minister's needs if it is necessary to sack the present authority. It is a pretty disgraceful comment on the way we manage our affairs. If we have been anxious to suggest abroad that this was a mature democracy, this action of the Minister seems to go contrary to that impression which we have been so sedulously cultivating and fostering—the Taoiseach principally—over recent years.
One wonders what the young ladies and gentlemen of the Oxford Union thought of it. It would not be the best way to win a motion at the Oxford Union to say that one was Prime Minister of a Cabinet who had just sacked every member of the authority of the only television station in the State because one had not liked a particular programme which they had transmitted. There would not be much chance of getting a vote for a united Ireland from such a university body on that basis. We have, of course, given unlimited joy to the most reactionary elements of the Unionist Party in Northern Ireland. The tragedy is that this action was unnecessary. The Minister would have us believe we were dealing with an authority who were unreliable in their positions of trust and had to be sacked, that they were people who might almost be equated with the subversive organisations the Minister feared. I am no lawyer but I would have thought that the individual members of the authority might have the material for an interesting court case with the Minister under the Civil Liabilities Act, 1961, on the manner of their dismissal.
The manner of the dismissal would suggest that the members of the RTE Authority were unworthy of their positions. I hope Deputy Burke might consult some of his legal colleagues to see if, in fact, we could have a test case on this matter. The Minister was not satisfied with the members of the authority. They sought a directive but the Minister did not give it to them. They finally got a letter from a civil servant in the Minister's Department saying they were out. This Minister, a short time before that, saw nothing wrong with the authority. He asked them to remain on at their posts. Would it not be human to think that the Minister did not suddenly come to this drastic change of opinion of the abilities and characters of the members of the authority? Surely we give a number of weeks' consideration and a period elapses before we say that X, Y or Z is unreliable or is a person of no ability or one we would not trust. Despite this, the Minister, on the evidence, twice called this authority back to their posts so pleased was he with their performance.
We could ask ourselves: "Is the Minister a sadist?" That may be regarded as unparliamentary but it is, to say the least of it, very peculiar conduct. He sacked all the members of an authority a short time after he asked them to stay on at their posts. Unless the Minister is in possession of facts in regard to the authority I am not in possession of, it would appear that the members of that authority conscientiously sought help from the Minister. This, it was suggested when the Bill was being debated here, should be the correct relationship between the Minister and the members of the authority. The trustees of the Minister in that authority sought advice from him but he did not give it to them in written form.
The conviction that the Minister deliberately and for political reasons decided to sack the authority, is strengthened when one realises that the Minister is, at this very time— there is a committee in session—reviewing the whole scope of broadcasting in this country. The committee is expected to report shortly. One would have thought that, if fundamental changes and a re-assessment were to emerge, the appropriate time would be when this report was available. The authority have also been engaged in an examination of broadcasting and television in the State. Their report is called A View of Irish Broadcasting. We have the situation in which the former members of the authority were engaged, as a result of the difficulties they had adverted to in correspondence with the Minister, in a fundamental assessment and investigation of the position.
On the other side, the Minister himself had set up a committee. Both sides were investigating independently, aware of certain difficulties but attempting to get solutions to them. The Minister refused to put in writing any of his conclusions in the matter of the implementation of section 31. He had given himself a great deal of manoeuvrability in his treatment of the authority by his refusal to be more specific in his letter to the authority under section 31. But he was aware of certain problems which that authority was encountering, as was the authority itself since both parties were themselves engaged in independent investigations. The authority said:
The terms of the direction generally are so imprecise as to be unsatisfactory in principle and to place an unfair burden on the authority.
The Minister had simply said to them that he did not wish to see broadcast a matter that would be calculated to promote the aims or activities of any organisation which engages in or promotes or encourages or advocates the attaining of any particular objective by violent means. The authority sought direction on the extent of this idea of promotion. They asked whether, for example, if there is a programme, say, on a northern topic in which an illegal organisation is referred to or the effect or consequences of certain of their actions, is one promoting their objectives by referring to the consequences of their action. I think this is a legitimate query. In broadcasting terms if one queries the opinion of a member of an illegal organisation is one promoting. To that question there was no reply from the Minister. The Minister cannot, in good conscience, say that he gave the authority an adequate direction when he did not give any advice to the authority that would give a certain preciseness of outline to his ideas on this matter of promotion.
We have previously referred to the fact that it was regrettable that on certain occasions one could not have a member of certain of these illegal organisations interviewed face to face so that the unsoundness, the thwarted view these organisations and their spokesmen had of certain events, could be exposed. It is arguable whether they should or should not be interviewed face to face. It is not a problem for the BBC evidently and it is not a problem evidently for many of our newspapers but there is a genuine difficulty here and nobody in this House wishes in any sense to see the spokesmen of groups that are not ready to submit themselves to the mandate of the ballot box advance stealthily or surreptitiously into the hearts and affections of the people of this country by giving them certain platforms. Nobody is in favour of any such development nor I think was anybody in the authority or in RTE willing to aid such appearances or lend themselves to such promotional activities. Their question was a legitimate one, the limitations to this idea of promoting. When is one promoting the affairs of subversive organisations and when is one in the wake of a particular event, bringing the question impartially before people so that once more ordinary men and women may condemn with their minds, have the opportunity of seeing once more when such an organisation has committed a dastardly act or seeing through a particular mistaken policy of an illegal organisation?
The Minister himself would appreciate that there was a great deal of ambivalence in his own party towards illegal organisations, anti-democratic organisations, in the period before Christmas. Things may have changed now. The fact is that there was a great deal of ambivalence. There was a great deal of ambivalence in this country up to last Christmas on how we should approach these anti-democratic organisations and their spokesmen. That ambivalence appears now to be dissipated but it undoubtedly existed. This represented very testing and unique difficulties for the television and broadcasting medium, probably difficulties never faced before in the history of the State. I think they honestly attempted to meet those problems. There were mistakes. As I would see it, and as I am sure many viewers saw it, certain prejudices existed in one programme or another but I honestly sympathise with the people who had to make those decisions, who had to put out those particular programmes. By and large, they attempted to do a fair job. They were dealing with events in the North that tore at some of our deepest feelings in this part of the country and if, on occasion, they appeared to err and their reportage appeared to lapse into propaganda on one side or another this was to be understood in the circumstances. They were not alone in that partiality over that period. They were entitled to seek clear direction from the Minister and I do not quite understand his refusal to help, by explicit direction, to say what exactly was meant when he talked about promoting the affairs of these organisations.
We must, in preserving democratic institutions, ensure that we do not adopt the methods of the adversaries of these same democratic institutions, that our cure is not worse than the disease. I am confident that the majority of the people of this State realise that the achievement of any settlement of the Northern question will not be settled by the overthrow of democratic institutions in this part of the country but we must not add to the cynicism of the general public by suggesting that henceforth Telefís Éireann is simply another arm of government. The late Seán Lemass said a lot of sensible things. I did not quite agree with his formulation of the relationship between Government and RTE.
I think that somebody earlier in the debate said that the broadcasting service cannot be seen as another turf station, another semi-State body because it deals with ideas and communicates with the mass of the people and in this sensitive area the relationship between it and the Government, if the viewer or listener is to have any confidence in that medium, must, to the extent that is possible under the Act, be independent. Henceforth, the listener or viewer cannot have this feeling. I do not say—although I should not be surprised if it were the case—that he will be faced with a procession of Government Ministers after every news bulletin between now and the approaching general election. I do not think there will be anything as crude as that, but the audience certainly cannot have a great deal of confidence that the programme they are seeing has not been vetted in the office of the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. They cannot have confidence that the station has the same independent status which it had two weeks ago—and even then it was not independent. But in the weeks ahead it cannot enjoy the authority which the old service had and it will, in a very real sense, have a very different relationship with the Government.
This debate has been dominated by the dismissal of the authority, as is quite proper since that was the major topic, but the Department ranges over many other areas which have been little referred to in the debate except by the opening speakers before this storm had broken. They had the advantage of looking at a situation which appeared to be stable. Appearances were deceptive. Normally, we would be saying that this or that should be done, improvements should be made here and there and that this programme was good or that person was very good in a certain programme. It is rather a pity that the debate had to be dominated by this issue but the issue is of such importance that whatever political party we belong to, all of us who believe in the importance of the democratic way of life—and I think all Members of the Dáil subscribe to this idea or they should not be here and subscribers to the laws passed by this Assembly— must regret this action by the Minister. I do not know if he is aware of it but his action has really forced the public to think for the first time, filled them with the idea for the first time that we were if not moving rapidly towards totalitarianism certainly taking steps in that direction.
That is why the Labour Party last week issued a warning to the public that if the authority were sacked it would be a muzzling of RTE. This muzzling came all the more peculiarly, ostensibly to ensure that the authority did not have programmes promoting the affairs of anti-democratic or illegal organisations from a Government which had been loath—to put it mildly —to uphold the rule of law in the past three years. That is why we issued that warning. I am sorry that we were proved more correct than any of us thought at the time. We had hoped our warning would at least have served in some sense to avert what we saw as a possible train of events but that warning was ignored, at least by the Minister. But members of the public throughout the country who are not and never would be in any sense supporters of any anti-democratic organisation are truly alarmed: Have the Government taken leave of their senses? What confidence can they have in a government that can be driven into this type of panicky measure?
The point has been made that there has been some kind of division between journalists in newspapers and those in television. I do not think so; I think all journalists realise that what has happened to RTE may very soon happen to them. We may not discuss it now but obviously what happened to the RTE Authority cannot be separated from the pending legislation which will be brought before the House by the Government today. This is all part of a pattern of a Government which is losing its head, a Government which stood idly by in the past three years when these anti-democratic organisations were recruiting. Now, later in the day it is attempting to beat an oversize law-and-order drum.
Personally—and I think the members of my party also—I have taken a strong line on the matter of fidelity to the democratic institutions of the State but we do not believe that the democratic idea is served by imposing censorship of any kind on the broadcasting medium. This suggests that we are taking over the political methods of the opponents of democracy. If people who believe in the democratic way of life adopt the weapons of their adversaries, then the democratic State is assailed on both sides—by the groups attempting to subvert it by imposing revolver rule and also by the defenders of the democratic way of life if they adopt methods which curtail freedom of expression. All Members of the House will, I think, take whatever measures are necessary to defend our democratic State against the imposition of anti-democratic rule, should it come to that, but the Minister would appear unwittingly to be aiding the anti-democratic forces by the nature of his action against the RTE Authority. The correspondence would seem to suggest that he deliberately set out to alter the relationship between the authority and the Oireachtas. There was his refusal to aid the members of the authority in response to their understandable request for advice on the implementation of his directive.
It would appear that the Minister wishes to revert to the pre-1960 situation in which he had direct, almost day-to-day, control over the affairs of broadcasting, and the manner of the Minister's treatment of the RTE Authority would appear to be a step backwards for democracy.
All of this the Taoiseach refers to as an exercise in democracy. We really are reaching an alarming stage when we use the language of democracy for this kind of Mafia operation on the authority. I find it incomprehensible that this should be the end of the correspondence between the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs and the authority. I understand the Minister said on some news programme yesterday that he had not been sparing in his advice to members of the authority, that he had met them frequently in discussions about this directive of his under section 31. I am not sure whether the Minister made that statement but I gather the Parliamentary Secretary was saying something to that effect last night. The Minister has a charming personality and is quite energetic in explaining what he really means in personal interview by a particular letter. However, I imagine that the unfortunate members of the authority were not saying: "We do not trust what you are saying to us here in interviews and in personal meetings but we would like certain reassurances in letter form from you."
They never received those important letters from the Minister and we now see how well grounded was that anxiety on the part of the authority. It is extraordinary that there should be no direction given from the Minister at the request of the authority from that date in October and that the next piece of correspondence is a letter dismissing them. That is what leads one to conclude that there has been this deliberate attempt on the part of the Government and the Minister to revert to the pre-1960 situation in the matter of the relationship between the authority and the Minister. That is why one is reminded once more of the earlier act of this Government, and the Minister's predecessor, the attempt to stop the public affairs programme "7 Days", through the "7 Days" Tribunal, in those happy days when the Government could concentrate at its leisure on "getting" RTE.
That is why one believes this action on the part of the Government was deliberately decided at a much earlier date. The Minister stalked the members of the authority before finally despatching them. As the former chairman said, the Minister was making himself judge and jury and the unfortunate defendants—in this case the members of the authority—were given no information on the circumstances of their guilt. Something has been left unexplained. The authority sought advice and was not given it, and the authority was finally sacked for insufficient reason, with consequences with which we all must now live, a television station which from now on must appear to the ordinary viewer up and down the country as a creature of Government policy.
At least it can be understood why we in the Labour Party believe that this was a pre-general election manoeuvre to ensure that RTE would relay what Big Brother wished RTE to relay, interview people whom Big Brother wished to be interviewed. All in all, we think the Minister's action has been a bad day's work for Irish democracy. It appalls our friends around the world, friends we are in need of at present, and suggests this State is rapidly degenerating to the shameful position of the republics that come and go in South America every day of the week. It suggests that the methods being adopted are more appropriate to the cumainn of the party to which the Minister belongs and do not have the responsible approach of a Minister of State. The vindictiveness of the Government's action suggests that they are not imbued with any great concern for the name of Ireland around the world, that they are insensitive to the effect on the cause of Irish unity, that they are insensitive to the predicament of those people in the North struggling by peaceful means for a united Ireland—witness the unanimous condemnation by the members of the SDLP, Messrs. Fitt, Hume, Currie, Cooper and Devlin. All of these men and women have been appalled by the Government's action.
The Government, unrepentant, unworried about these effects, move on today to further appalling actions, further attacks on liberty. At this time all democrats must be worried, ruled as we are by a Government panic-stricken, vindictive, lashing out in all directions, attempting late in the day to nail their colours to the mast of fidelity to the rule of law, standards which they did not live by over the past three years. The Minister's action must suggest to the ordinary viewers that from now on they would be more properly employed listening to a gramophone record than listening to the programmes coming from RTE because the new authority cannot have the same status as that of the one sacked by the Minister. The Minister owes this House a full explanation as to why he felt this action was necessary. In reverting to the pre-1960 situation, he should also explain under what legislation he is operating.
