RadioReview: 'He's back, he's black. Well, he has been on holidays." There's probably no need to clarify that this was the introduction to John Creedon's programme on Monday (RTÉ Radio 1, Mon-Fri) because let's face it, where else would you get it?
Creedon has been away for the past month and his response to this "comedy intro" (the programme prides itself on its "comedy" content) was, "Inside I'm black, outside I'm pure honky."
Then this soul brother played one of those tunes that captured the mood of his programme - a yodelling song.
On Wednesday Ryan Tubridy (RTÉ Radio 1, Mon-Fri) broadcast from a kitchen in Dundrum on Dublin's southside and for entertainment he had Chris De Burgh on hand to sing Lady in Red and Patricia the Stripper. Pat Kenny's show is now a two-hour oasis of good talk radio surrounded by blather.
Kenny (Today with Pat Kenny, RTÉ Radio 1, Mon-Fri) started the week with a debate on childcare and listeners can expect more of the same as it becomes a hot pre-Budget potato, but it would be nice to think it could be a civilised and productive debate without divisive language. John Waters seemed keen on the expression "parents dumping their children in creches", and I kept waiting for Pat Kenny to pick him up on it because from previous interviews with parents he knows well how inflammatory such a deliberately hurtful description is - and it's simply wrong. It doesn't in any way reflect the reality of what goes on in working parents' lives.
Do parents really "dump" their children anywhere? The way the anti-creche side - and it is all unhelpfully getting down to "sides" in this debate - talk about creches you'd think they were one step up from Romanian orphanages. It's going to get ugly.
Not half as ugly, however, as the picture that emerged on Liveline (RTÉ Radio 1, Mon-Fri) of solicitors ripping-off some of the most vulnerable people in our society. It was a classic week for the show, with callers (starting on Tuesday and continuing all week), revealing the slimy underbelly of that profession. The callers were survivors of institutional child abuse, some in their 70s, who are being financially compensated through the State-established Residential Institutions Redress Board (RIRB).
Part of the deal is that the State will pay all their legal expenses. However, callers told of solicitors who had taken additional "fees" for their work - in some cases, straight out of the compensation cheque - sums between €600 and €13,000 were mentioned. "And was the bill itemised?" asked Duffy. "If you get a cup of coffee and a bun in Roches Stores, the bill is itemised." No chance of that in any of these cases.
Charging this additional fee suggests that the solicitors in question are being paid twice for the same work - unfortunately the programme couldn't name and shame them, presumably, and ironically, for legal reasons.
Last year the redress board paid out an average of €10,000 to each solicitor representing a survivor - so it's not bad work if you can get it.
The way most of the "fee"-charging solicitors did it, according to the callers, said it all. Typically, just before the understandably nervous and stressed survivor went into the room to sit before the Redress Board, their solicitor would casually mention that there had been a "shortfall" in expenses so an additional fee would have to be paid out of the compensation.
It does seem to be a minority of solicitors involved, but now that the story has been pushed out into the open in the way that only Liveline can, perhaps the extent of it can be ascertained and a second round of redress, this time by the grabbing solicitors, can be made to the survivors. The big question will be what the self-regulated legal profession is going to do about it.
This week Yoko Ono, speaking at an awards ceremony in London, rubbished Paul McCartney's lyrics, saying that he was all "moon" rhyming with "June", and not a patch on her husband. Cue the inevitable examination of John Lennon's lyrics, which Mark Lawson and his guest, comedy writer David Quantick (Front Row, BBC Radio 4, Tuesday), took on with gusto. They started with lyrics from his album Sometime in New York City, which included gems such as "leprechaun" rhyming with "Blarney Stone".
Lawson offered Leonard Cohen's bravura rhyming in Alleluia, where he makes the title rhyme with "through ya", "fool ya" and "to ya", though listeners who were asked to contact the programme with their suggestions of the worst rhymes ever ("is it Yoko or O No, a list is being compiled") would be hard-pressed to beat Quantick's nomination of Snap's big disco hit Rhythm is a Dancer, which included the lines "I'm serious as cancer/ When I say that rhythm is a dancer."
