An RTE broadcast last year gave an unfair advantage to the daughter of Mr Des O'Malley and a niece of Mr Liam Cosgrave, when they were interviewed as candidates in the local election campaign, the Broadcasting Com plaints Commission has ruled.
While the commission said that in this way the broadcast was not fair to all interests concerned, it rejected the contention that it was not presented in an objective and impartial manner.
The criticism was the only one levelled out of decisions on six complaints the commission received about RTE programmes in 1999. The other five complaints were rejected.
The complaint about the coverage of the local election campaign last year referred to the This Week programme on May 23rd. Mr Richard Greene, a candidate, complained about an item on "political dynasties" in which Mr O'Malley's daughter and Mr Cos grave's niece were interviewed.
He claimed the interviews gave publicity to the particular candidates, giving them advantage over other candidates. He also stated that RTE was in breach of the law by not interviewing all candidates in the relevant wards.
RTE in its response said the report was a legitimate item of interest in the campaign which was not attracting public attention. It had a public service duty to facilitate political discussion, particularly where there was a danger of low voter participation.
As there were 3,000 candidates in the campaign, it would be impossible to give the same airtime to each. RTE's coverage was confined to a discussion of the main issues. It acted in a manner fair to all interests and did not express its own views on the matter.
The commission said it was of the view that the broadcast did give an unfair advantage to the candidates concerned. In this way the broadcast was not fair to all interests concerned. "The Broadcasting Complaints Commission rejected the contention that the broadcast was not presented in an objective and impartial manner," the decision stated.
Mr Andrew Kiernan, secretary of the Immigration Control Platform, made a complaint about Today with Rodney Rice, stating that Mr Rice advised the public to listen to NEAR FM, which was discussing refugees and asylum-seekers, and this led to a partisan view. RTE said Mr Rice was not endorsing any view but giving the listeners access to information.
The commission rejected the complaint, stating it could in no way be interpreted as infringing the broadcasting legislation.
Another complaint was made against the same programme by Father Aidan Larkin who said that discussion about a book was disrespectful to Catholics concerning sexual morality. RTE stated the item arose from a press re lease from the Vatican which restated the Catholic Church's position on masturbation. The com mission rejected the complaint.
Two of the complaints related to coverage of a court case about Youth Defence, the first on news reports and the second on the Marian Finucane Show. The commission decided the reports were impartial. E's own views. A complaint that a news item concerning the birth of octuplets and a reference to the mother refusing to consider abortion was partisan was not a breach of RTE's statutory duty to be objective and impartial, the commission ruled.