Bit perturbed that there hasn’t being more of a controversy over Denis O’Brien’s massive power in Irish media now. Even putting ethics aside it can’t be healthy to have one man with so much power. Ireland’s media now one of the weakest in Europe.
Vincent Brown had a decent article on this in the Irish Times yesterday. We effectively don’t have any media outlets to call those in power to account. It’s pretty shameful. The likes of broadsheet.ie or NAMA Wine Lake are the closest we have.
What can be done about it though Laurence? Forced break-up of O’Brien’s empire? No politician is going to have the guts to do that.
…is full of clowns who write shit like this taken from Ian O’Riordan’s report on the banty crisis during the week.
“McEnaney also attended Wicklow’s final game in the Football League on Sunday, given Meath are set to play Wicklow in their Leinster championship opener on May 27th. His stubbornness could well work for or against him, but either way he’s certainly not helped by the status of the man in the opposite corner.”
now??
the media that were happy with censorship are now weak?
[quote=“The All Seeing Eye, post: 673379”]
now??
the media that were happy with censorship are now weak?[/quote]
Exactly mate. The Irish media has been onside with those in power since the foundation of the state.
O’Reilly was replaced by Vincent Crowley, an individual who is definitely in the O’Reilly camp as opposed to the O’Brien one.
Nothing has changed since last week outside of Dermot Desmond acquiring some more shares so that status quo from three years ago, when Crowley effectively headed up INM remains more or less.
However, three years ago all staff took a cut in their wages in return for shre options which they could exercise after three years. Any increase in the share price above €0.30 could see more shares coming onto the market and O’Brien and Desmond getting to the point where they can make an outright bid for the newspaper. That is when things get tricky and the EU would have to start askign questions on monopoly like they did with the attempted takeover of Aer Lingus by Ryanair.
Our printed press has always been agenda driven since they were founded by political parties during the emergence of the State. New media entities like Broadsheet and The Journal will hopefully drive the change to an independent online press. The newspapers will never change as they’re dependent on the funds of the agenda setters.
Why are you so pro-sir Anthony larry? I know u were a big fan of Veronica Guerin but surely enough time has passed.
I think the media spend too much time talking about the media and it’s not so relevant. I people are unhappy with a news slant there will be a demand for another source.
You probably shouldn’t take all you news from the Belfast telegraph larry
I think the real lack of print competition is in the Sundays. The Irish Times will always provide some sort of counter-balance to the daily Indo in addition to the red-tops etc.
In the Sundays though, the SINDO has had it’s own way - largely due to the lack of a compelling alternative. I’ve always wondered why the Business Post didn’t add a sports department (the Tribunes?) and just become the Sunday Post.
Denis O’Brien must be stopped, his investment in Phantom FM led to the addition of Curtis Stigers to the play list.
They don’t have the money to invest in it TB. They’ve taken a gamble in their online market which may pay off given that the most successful online entities have been niché titles like The Financial Times where companies are willing to take out a corporate subscription.
The Irish Times will be lucky to be in business in 12 months time unless they are subject to a buy out.
I wonder why?
Colm Keena had a piece in Irish Times yesterday on this topic.
THE DEPARTURE this week of Gavin O’Reilly from his position as chief executive of Independent News Media plc (IN&M) is the latest development in the fascinating controversy over Denis O’Brien and media ownership.
O’Brien’s decade-old battle with Gavin’s father, Sir Anthony O’Reilly, and his related investment in IN&M shares (he is down half a billion euro) is proving rich fare for those interested in the relationship between business, politics and the media.
The recent attacks on O’Brien in the Sunday Independent must be close to unique in world terms, given that the target is IN&M’s largest shareholder. It would be difficult now for a multimillionaire newspaper owner to argue that ownership issues do not affect media content.
And media content is at the core of the concerns about O’Brien. He is a hugely wealthy businessman who has been the subject of the very serious tribunal finding that he made a payment to former Fine Gael minister Michael Lowry while Lowry was overseeing who would get the most valuable licence issued to date by the State (a licence to sell mobile phone services).
As his recent success in buying the construction support services group, Siteserv, has shown, O’Brien continues to seek out business opportunities in the Irish economy. It is possible that Siteserv could end up installing the water meters that households throughout the State will have to pay for over the coming years as part of our response to the collapse of the Irish tax take.
O’Brien is non-resident in Ireland for tax purposes and bought Siteserv using an Isle of Man company. His purchase of Siteserv involved State-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation – which incorporates Anglo Irish Bank – agreeing to write off Siteserv bank debt of approximately €110 million.
In this sort of context, any suggestion that O’Brien’s ownership of so much of Ireland’s private media might mute robust examination and discussion of his business dealings here – by the media, politicians and public bodies – is a matter of legitimate concern.
The businessman’s direct dealings with journalists over the years are another reason for worry.
O’Brien has had a career-long interest in the media and current affairs and is unusual in the extent to which he is willing to talk on a one-to-one basis with reporters.
He and his supporters have repeatedly rejected the charge that he has directly interfered in editorial matters in his radio stations, and it is only fair to note that those who have written in recent times about the O’Brien/media ownership issue have included Matt Cooper in his column in the Sunday Times. (Cooper is a presenter on Today FM which O’Brien owns.)
However, it is common currency among journalists that one proceeds with particular caution when reporting on matters affecting O’Brien. He is a very driven man who can hold strong dislikes. In the wake of the Moriarty tribunal’s findings he was forceful, to put it mildly, in his criticisms of the tribunal chairman, its legal team and the judiciary generally.
His decision to sue journalist Sam Smyth over comments made by Smyth in relation to the tribunal and O’Brien showed a similar determination not to let his position in society restrain him. At the time Smyth had a radio show with Today FM, and he remains one of the Independent group’s best-known journalists. The fact that O’Brien chose to sue the journalist but not the media that carried his comments was a notable aspect of the affair. (The case is still pending.)
Over the years journalists and others who have written about tribunal matters have received a slew of letters from O’Brien and his lawyers, threatening legal action or complaining about comments made and seeking retractions and rights of reply. He tends not to avail of the non-legal, and less intimidating, Press Council/ Press Ombudsman route. Of course he is fully entitled to seek recourse to the law, but it is nevertheless a strange approach for Ireland’s premier media magnate.
All of this feeds into the fact that media organisations are susceptible to being inhibited by rich people who threaten to sue, and that self-censorship is all but inevitable among journalists who have to write about the affairs of their employer or their employer’s friends and business associates.
But none of this means that the Government should have a role in deciding who it deems suitable to own media companies. (An Phoblacht was being published every week by Sinn Féin when the IRA was blowing up people as they sat in pubs or walked down city streets).
The Government’s focus instead should be on ensuring there is a diversity of ownership on the Irish media scene, so any ownership factors that affect one media outlet can (ideally) be offset by the presence of others.
This appears to be the view of Minister for Communications Pat Rabitte, who has said he is “interested in the different aspects of concentration of ownership and cross-media ownership and with one oligarch as compared to another oligarch.”
There is a view among many observers that Fine Gael is more sanguine about O’Brien’s position on the Irish media landscape than are members of the Labour Party. Some Labour members may believe the party can gain political advantage by making its concerns about O’Brien an issue, although principled concern also seems to be at play. (Both Fine Gael and Labour have long held the view that IN&M treated them unfairly during the O’Reilly era.)
Responsibility for drafting new legislation to govern media ownership is in the process of being transferred to Rabbitte’s department from that of Richard Bruton’s Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation.
The key issue will be the limitation that will be created for one owner’s presence in the Irish media sector. Any such limit might curtail O’Brien’s current prominence, or even the existence of a newspaper group of IN&M’s size.
Outside of this legislative issue, there is another aspect of media ownership that is worth raising. All things being equal, is it better to have an Irish mogul owning Irish media than having Irish media assets being owned by individuals and corporations who have no interest in the country other than the profit they produce?
O’Brien may be non-resident here for tax reasons, but he has very strong links with Ireland in terms of family, friends and business interests. He is a networker who knows a wide range of people throughout society. Offensive media product, or the adoption of editorial lines that many might consider damaging to the national interest, would rebound on him socially.
An example of how this can work was provided some years ago when Channel 6 was considering broadcasting soft porn after midnight. The strong reaction of some of its then Irish shareholders, who didn’t want to be associated with such content, led to the idea being dropped. The same sort of feedback process could apply to media outlets that were enjoying, for example, a commercial advantage from adopting a xenophobic or extreme Eurosceptic response to the ongoing economic crisis.
An Irish oligarch with friends and family here might be less inclined to go down such a road than, say, an Australian in New York who never takes a call from a Dublin reporter from one end of the year to the next.
Developments at IN&M are far from settled and it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that it could end up in foreign ownership.
KEY PLAYER DENIS O’BRIEN’S PORTFOLIO
- IN&M, which has significant interests in Australia and South Africa, is Ireland’s largest private media company. Its newspaper titles include the Irish Independent, the Sunday Independent, the Evening Herald, the Sunday World and the Star, as well as 13 weekly, paid-for regional titles. Denis O’Brien has a 22 per cent stake in the company.
- O’Brien’s Communicorp is an international radio group. In Ireland it owns Newstalk, Today FM, 98 FM, Spin 103.8, Phantom and Spin South West.
- O’Brien has extensive business interests in Ireland including Siteserv, irishjobs.ie, property investments, an aircraft financing business, a shareholding in Topaz and a 3 per cent stake in Aer Lingus. He recently looked at buying Eircom. He was one of the largest borrowers from Anglo Irish Bank but is believed to have since paid off much of his debt. He is a director of the National College of Ireland.
- Last year former US president Bill Clinton flew to Ireland on O’Brien’s private jet to attend the Global Irish Economic Forum in Dublin Castle, which was hosted by Taoiseach Enda Kenny.
- He funds half the salary of the Ireland soccer manager, Giovanni Trapattoni.
the NCI link would prove very interesting if any journo took a serious look at it. ten years ago, they were debt free, had a large campus in ranelagh which should have been one of the tastiest sites for the developer. then joyce o’connor took over, they sold ranelagh, bought a concrete bunker in ifsc and are in around 50m of debt. it should be mentioned that joyce’s brother is none other than seanie fitz and the financing for the mayor street campus came from none other than anglo with the gleeful cooperation of the DDDA. the whole thing stinks more than one of mbb’s wank socks
My enjoyment of Euro 2012 is being somewhat sullied by the amount of work Trap is being forced to do for Denis O’Brien. Newstalk last night, something for that Foley lad on Today FM today.
He who pays the piper and all that. I feel like a lightbulb just went off over my head btw, never made the connection at all when I heard the off the ball lads going on about Trap being in their Pod last night.
Ryan Giggs is lead story on Ireland’s State Broadcaster News. Show how times have changed.
Not just RTE Larry. Top story on the London times as well.
Slight difference between a News Int English paper and an Irish state broadcaster though.
True. Sign of the times. We are all English now.
The time has come
[SIZE=6]Celebrate peace by letting Ireland join the Commonwealth - MP[/SIZE]
[SIZE=5]Ireland should join the Commonwealth following the Queen’s dinner with Martin McGuinness, says Michael Fabricant[/SIZE]
Former IRA commander Martin McGuinness at Windsor Castle during the visit of Ireland’s president, Michael D Higgis Photo: THE TIMES
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01932/Matthew-Holehouse__1932306j.jpg
By Matthew Holehouse, Political Correspondent
10:00PM BST 21 Apr 2014
Ireland should join the Commonwealth in the wake of Martin McGuinness’ dinner with the Queen as a signal to the world of peaceful reconciliation, a senior Conservative has said.
Michael Fabricant, the MP for Lichfield and a former vice-chairman of the Conservative Party, said the visits of the Queen to Dublin in 2011 and President Higgins’ reciprocal state visit last week had “put an end to over ninety years of discord.”
The presence of Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander who is now Northern Ireland’s deputy first minister, at the state banquet showed that “times have indeed moved on”.
The next step in the relationship should be inviting Ireland to join the Commonwealth, the club of 53 former British dominions and overseas territories.
Such a move would likely be met with hostility by Republicans who are implacably opposed to anything resembling a return to British rule over the island.
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But, Mr Fabricant writes for Telegraph.co.uk, the proposal “is not so mad as it might at first seem”, because the Commonwealth today is founded on co-operation between English-speaking states with shared histories and legal systems.
“If a country like the Republic of Ireland joined the Commonwealth, what greater message could be sent to countries facing political upheaval and disputes on the other side of the world than an ancient country who had drawn a line under parts of its past, whilst promoting its future on the best parts of its heritage?” Mr Fabricant writes.
“The very fact that a monarch who had for so long had been the embodiment of one side of the troubles was able to visit Ireland and to engender a feeling of such good will is a clear demonstration of a new chapter.
“The past will never be forgotten nor would it be right for that to be the case.
“But when you witness people like Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander whose comrades were responsible for the death of Lord Louis Mountbatten, attend a State banquet hosted by the Queen at Windsor Castle, there aren’t many better signals than that to show that times have indeed moved on.”
Ireland was excluded from the Commonwealth when it became a republic in 1949.
However, when India became a republic a year later it was allowed to remain in the club and recognised the Queen as its head.
Today sixteen Commonwealth realms have the Queen as head of state, while 33 are republics and five have monarchs from other families.
Could republican Ireland join the club for former colonies? It’s not as mad as it sounds, writes Michael Fabricant
Last week’s state visit of the Irish President, Michael D. Higgins, put to an end to over 90 years of discord between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. It of course followed the hugely historic visit of the Queen to the Republic in 2011, herself the daughter of the last King of Ireland and a witness to the lugubrious relationship throughout a large chunk of the 20th century.
Both visits neither fix the discord, nor bring to an end the difficulties that still exist to this day. What the visits do represent however is the next stage. The very fact that a monarch who had for so long had been the embodiment of one side of the troubles was able to visit Ireland and to engender a feeling of such good will is a clear demonstration of a new chapter.
The past will never be forgotten nor would it be right for that to be the case.
But when you witness people like Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander whose comrades were responsible for the death of Lord Louis Mountbatten, attend a State banquet hosted by the Queen at Windsor Castle, there aren’t many better signals than that to show that times have indeed moved on.
The commitment from the Irish and British governments to put aside differences and look towards unity and joint working on equal terms is demonstrable. The Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, said following the Queen’s visit of 2011 that no neighbour is closer, and no two countries have such joint interests in trade and bilateral interests in Europe. British and Irish citizens hold reciprocal rights to residency and employment in both countries. It is even estimated that 10% of the British population have a grandparent or parent of Irish decent. And Britain’s biggest export destination in all the EU is Ireland.
With such close links of geography, trade, culture and of course family ties, what does the next stage of this relationship look like?
How about Ireland joining the Commonwealth? This is not so mad as it might at first seem.
The association of the Commonwealth is about unity through diversity. 54 countries around the world, not all linked to Britain, is an important organisation because of its power of cooperation and shared ideals. The fact that many of the countries share the common law, the English language and a degree of common heritage of course enforces an anchoring of the past, but it looks to the future too.
If a country like the Republic of Ireland joined the Commonwealth, what greater message could be sent to countries facing political upheaval and disputes on the other side of the world than an ancient country who had drawn a line under parts of its past, whilst promoting its future on the best parts of its heritage?
As for Ireland, when the Irish Free State was formed in the 1920s, its Head of State was left ambiguous. The Irish constitution of 1936 left both the King of Ireland and the President of the Republic in place. It was not until 1949 that the President was formally recognised as the only Head of State. George VI, The Queen’s father, was the last King of Ireland.
As a result, republics were not allowed entry into the Commonwealth, leaving Ireland on the outside. At the same time, India was undergoing similar changes to its constitution. With its size and importance as part of the Commonwealth, the rules were changed and India remained inside the tent of the Commonwealth.
History could have been so very different.
Some will ask whether the Commonwealth still has any importance, or whether it is simply a delusion of British influence on the world’s stage. But what would be missed, if that were the case, would be the importance of its influence in the rest of the world.
Of course it would be for the Irish Government to decide whether it wanted to join. It might feel that it would be a step too far; but as a British parliamentarian with no particular connection to Ireland, I would like to see it.
British-Irish relations are ones of missed opportunities and sadness. Let’s end that for good, and be the very best of neighbours.
Michael Fabricant is MP for Lichfield