Last night I mentioned the fact that I would like to refer briefly to some points which I feel should be mentioned when this Estimate appears before the House. I began last night before the House adjourned with the question of television reception in Connemara. This matter has been raised before but it still has not been rectified and I would like to refer to it again. It is hard on those people when you consider we had a football team in the All-Ireland this year and a large part of the county could not follow the fortunes of the favourite team because they could not get reception. This is rather a difficult and awkward situation for public representatives and the sooner the position is rectified the sooner every one of us will be happy about it.
There is one other thing in relation to television to which I would like to refer. The West is always placed in a most unfavourable light, and this also applies to Radio Éireann on the broadcasting side, in the weather forecast. We know the prevailing winds come from the west, but we do not have to have day after day this sad-faced forecaster telling us about imminent rain from the west, which we never see to the extent they would like or wish upon us.
We are living in a part of the country which is very much dependent on the attraction of tourists to the area and in which the question of weather is an important factor, and we feel that this type of mention which we are constantly getting on our television and radio sets is detrimental in its own way to the great work done there to promote the tourist industry. We are prepared to accept the weather God sends us but not the weather Radio Éireann and Telefís Éireann wish to send us. They are frequently wrong in this and should be a bit more careful. It might be a good shot to say there is rain in the west if they believe there is never anything else there. If they came down and visited us more often and saw the beautiful sunshine we get, they might treat us more kindly in their sometimes wholly incorrect forecasts.
Last night mention was made about long-haired individuals appearing on television screens and some people said that sheep shears could be used to make them more presentable looking. I could never agree with that outlook, that we should present only what we think is acceptable to the majority. I think we should in our television service go out of our way to serve all sections of the community of all ages. The producers understand that and are doing quite a good job, and I do not see any objection to providing the type of entertainment which younger people expect to see on television. I compliment them on what they are doing in that regard.
I would like to criticise one aspect which one notices from time to time of the news broadcasts. Producers do not seem to show a terrible lot of respect for people who have recently, shall we say, suffered a loss in their family, by showing films and pictures of people in their hour of grief. It is not very kind, certainly not very Irish, to project some poor lady in her grief into every home in the country at a time when this lady's, or any other person's privacy should be respected. I am referring in particular to the pictures of the funeral of Sister O'Sullivan in respect of that family. I just wish to mention it but not to speak too much or say any more about it. I would ask them to be a little more selective and to show a little more respect for people and their privacy.
The question of the Irish language on television is something that interests me very much, indeed, agus ag labhairt faoi sin ba mhaith liom chomhgáir-deachas a dhéanamh le lucht RTE as ucht an méid atá á dhéanamh aca chun an Ghaeilge a chur ar aghaidh. Tig liom a rá gur tháinig feabhas mór ar an obair a bhí á dhéanamh aca ó tháinig Eoin Ó Súilleabháin—fear as mo chontae féin—go dtí an seirbhís.
Ba mhaith liom rud amháin a mholadh do lucht stiúrtha na gcláranna i nGaeilge—deis a thúirt do na daoine a d'fhoghlaim an Ghaeilge ar scoil dul ar roint de na cláranna atá á gcur amach aca. Molaim é sin toisc gur insna scoileanna a d'fhoghlaim an chuid is mó de na daoine seo a gcuid Gaeilge.
Dá ndéanfaí é sin, do bhainfidís níos mó taithnimh as na cláracha. Nuair a chloiseann said daoine a bhfuil an Ghaeilge aca ó dhúchas agus an blas atá aca feictear dóibh nach féidir leo féin Gaeilge den tsaghas sin a labhairt choíche. Cuireann sin díomá ortha. Nílim ag caint faoi Ghaeilge Chonamara amháin ach Gaeilge Chiarraí agus Gaeilge Dhún na nGall chomh maith. Dá mbainfí níos mó úsáid as na daoine seo a bhfuil Gaeilge aca a d'fhoghlamaíodar ar scoil, tá mé cinnte go mbeadh an-dul chun cinn ar fad maidir le leathnú úsáid na teanga.
Ba mhaith liom traoslú le gach duine a bhfuil baint aige leis na cláracha seo i nGaeilge, go mór mhór leo siúd a bhfuil baint aca leis na drámaí. Bhain mé féin an-tairbhe as an obair íontach a dheineadar le goirid i léiriú "Cúirt an Mheán-Oíche".
With regard to the Late Late show which was a rather popular programme, televised when most people in the country were free, on Saturday night, to sit back in anticipation of enjoying the programme, of late I think they have lost the originality and the appeal to the people which they had in the beginning. If they want advice from us here, I would advise them to think twice about the way they are presenting the programme at the moment. We see too many foreigners on this programme, people of whom we have never heard before and never will hear again. They are introduced with great accolade and blowing of trumpets. We ask ourselves: "Who is this man we have never heard of or seen before?" and the further the programme goes the better we know that we could not possibly have heard of him before. They seem to make stars overnight of some people just to present them on the programme.
We have plenty of good Irish characters all over the country whom the people could enjoy on this programme. We are inclined to forget about the native talent when it comes to presenting entertaining programmes on the television. I would make the suggestion to those involved in producing the Late Late Show that they should use more of the Irish talent and character that we have in the country instead of bringing in those tin-pot film stars who are only spending a week here and did not know where Ireland was a week before they came. By playing up this kind of thing, I do not think it will do much for our image or self-confidence.
I would like to comment on the staff in the GPO and sub-post offices in my own county. It can be safely said now that any letter posted in County Galway will be delivered by the next day. That applies to the whole of West Galway anyway, Galway city and Connemara, except the Islands, of course. That is a great step forward. It is a wonderful service and I think compliments are due to the staffs and the Department officials who have worked so hard to bring this about.
On the question of van deliveries, it is only a question of time until the complete postal service will be motorised, certainly in my constituency. We often complain about the slowness of telephones and other things and it is nice to be able to compliment the Department when you see a job being well done.
A special word of thanks is due to the staff in the same GPO and sub-post offices who were involved on a certain day when two young men rowed across the Atlantic and the whole press of the world seemed to descend upon us in Galway. I know, from personal account, of the willingness of the officials in the General Post Office and sub-post offices involved in Galway to co-operate in what was an emergency. We had 40 or 50 pressmen, all trying to get on three lines to the Aran Islands. We had men who stayed up all day and all night to try to help out as best they could, and I understand that it was of no financial gain to the people in the sub-post offices who provided this excellent service to those men when they descended upon us. It is largely thanks to the work of the post office officials that it was said, very shortly afterwards, that if anybody wants to cross the Atlantic and to get publicity out of it the best place he could land is Galway because everybody seems to co-operate in times of emergency. When a thing like this suddenly descends, it is difficult to be on your toes but on that occasion the post office staff provided an excellent service.
There is one matter I would like to raise. It relates to the staff on the engineering side of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. It is something with which, I think, the Minister himself would have some sympathy. It is the question of a young boy who is taken in as a trainee technician and who does not pass the examination which is necessary at the end of the first year. As a trainee technician, he might get a second chance but if he fails at the end of the second year, he is out completely. There are lower grades and I think it should be possible for the Department to accept these trainee technicians who have not passed in the examination and to bring them in under the installer grade. It seems rather a waste of time and energy which the senior staffs have put into the training of these young men.
When they do not reach the required standards in that grade, I think it is a pity if the service is to lose them, having invested time and energy in them. The proper thing to do seems to me to be to bring them in at the installer level. I make this suggestion to the Minister and I think he has a certain sympathy with it. It is time something was done about it. A young man who spends one or two years at this is in a very awkward position if he does not succeed in his examination. He is out in the street again, whereas he is more than fit for employment in the Department of Posts and Telegraphs as an installer with the experience and training he has got in his efforts to become a trainee teachnician.
I would also like to compliment the Sports Department of Telefís Éireann. It must be one of the finest sports reporting departments in any television service in the world. They certainly go out of their way if there is something on to give the people in the country an opportunity of seeing it. There is great credit due to them. There is no need for me to mention any names. I would suggest that when they are covering sports in which the ordinary staff are not very well up, it might be an idea if they were to bring in people from organisations to do the commentary for them. I refer in particular to commentaries on the Irish Swimming Championships in Mosney this year where a man was put on as a commentator who had not any great knowledge of swimming, who did not know the swimmers and who did not really understand what the whole thing was about. There are in the Swimming Association very many able commentators who would have been able to put that across and they would not have wasted so many tapes, which unfortunately happened because of wrong names and the person concerned not understanding the situation in that sport. Telefís Éireann are inclined to confine the commentaries to the few people they have in the service rather than bring in temporary people who have a greater knowledge and make use of that knowledge to put the image across.
Last night, and indeed for the length of time this Estimate has been before the House, most of the Opposition speakers spent their time criticising the action of a certain Minister and tried to imply that the television service and the radio broadcasting service were completely dominated and run by the Fianna Fáil Government. Anybody who would believe that would be very naive indeed because it is evident to most people and indeed it was most evident on the occasion this was raised here in the House, when the Minister for Education intervened from the storm that descended upon him from the front benches of the Fine Gael Party that Fine Gael were looking on Telefís Éireann as their little empire. The editor of the Irish Times was not far wrong in his editorial this morning where he more or less hints at something on the same lines. The reason the front benches of Fine Gael were so terribly worried—we saw Deputy Cosgrave get very hot under the collar about it—was that they were afraid the grip they had on Telefís Éireann was slipping out of their hands.
