GARRET FITZGERALD was among our first generation of television politicians. Much of the focus on the former taoiseach’s legacy in recent months has been on his written output, but his entire career in politics was played out in front of the cameras. RTÉ, the first domestic television service, went on air on New Year’s Eve in 1961. FitzGerald was elected to the Seanad in 1965 and won a Dáil seat at the 1969 general election. All of his predecessors lived through the world of newspapers and, to a degree, radio.
But for political figures who first emerged in the 1960s – and all those who followed – the archives in RTÉ, and more recently in TG4 and TV3, contain images from almost every aspect of their careers in public life.
Along with his great rival Charles Haughey, FitzGerald made a small piece of Irish broadcasting history in participating in the first ever televised leaders’ debate in February 1982. Four times in a decade FitzGerald and Haughey went before the electorate seeking a mandate to govern, and on three of those occasions they went head-to-head in live debates.
The format had been tested in the United States in 1960 when John Kennedy and Richard Nixon drew millions of viewers for the first American presidential debates. Despite their success with audiences, the debates were allowed lapse until 1976, and then four years later Ronald Reagan charmed his way into the White House with his hugely effectively “there you go again” putdown of Jimmy Carter. The attraction of a similar format for RTÉ executives in single-station Ireland was obvious. FitzGerald and Haughey – by now well schooled to the camera – saw the benefit in reaching vast number of voters in a single evening.
The programme in February 1982 opened with the late Barry Cowan setting the scene and reminding viewers of the historic nature of the television debate. “Tonight for the first time,” Cowan declared in the dramatic fashion of a sporting encounter before quickly handing over to the debate moderator, Brian Farrell. There were no opening statements by the two party leaders, while Farrell offered no niceties as he got straight down to business with a short first question.
The entire debate was marked by Farrell’s non-intrusive approach. Like a top-flight tennis match the discussion between the two politicians batted over-and-back. There were long stretches with no intervention from the programme presenter. Both leaders took up each other’s points and challenged each other. There was little rancour and hardly any interjections or grandstanding. But watching the debate again from this vantage point it is clear that neither man liked the other. This is particularly evident in their body language. When FitzGerald was speaking his Fianna Fáil counterpart watched with an obvious look of distain although when he replied the tone was ever-so-courteous.
The economic situation dominated the discussion. As the clock approached the 40-minute mark Farrell made a rare intervention: "We're running 10 minutes over – last comment on employment." The debate on the economy is eerily familiar to the exchanges in this year's general election. Most attention is given to cutting public spending, taxation rates and job creation. It is as if 1982 and 2011 are linked seamlessly with the intervening years wiped away, like Bobby Ewing stepping out of the shower in Dallas.
The programme paused for a commercial break after which the discussion moved onto crime, constitutional reform and Northern Ireland. A different world emerged when the two leaders debate attitudes to contraception legislation and the introduction of divorce. The televised debate is a potent reminder that the transformation of Irish society – which is now taken for granted – was hard fought for in the divisive decade of the 1980s.
By the time FitzGerald and Haughey debated again at the 1987 general election they were more than familiar with each other as party leaders. There was a tetchiness in the exchanges right from the outset as they disputed their respective records in office. FitzGerald sought to press Haughey on his economic figures. “We don’t want to get into percentages,” Haughey replied. The Fianna Fáil leader later said, “the taxman is nobody’s friend” – which draws a different reaction in 2011 than it did in 1987 in light of subsequent revelations about his financial affairs.
The three debates between FitzGerald and Haughey were historic. No other leaders faced each other so often in these televised formats. But they are very much from another era – the debates were overseen by a single broadcaster, RTÉ, and involved two political parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. The election earlier this year saw the involvement of other broadcasters, TV3 and TG4, and a final acceptance that it was impossible to exclude Labour, and also that the smaller parties should even be invited to participate.
The pace is faster now. The sound bites are better rehearsed. When Enda Kenny, Eamon Gilmore and Micheál Martin sat around the Prime Timetable Miriam O'Callaghan had to manage confrontation. Interjections and raised voices are accepted as a normal part of the debate format. Two decades previously Brian Farrell only had to politely say to Garret FitzGerald, "Taoiseach, I hesitate to interrupt you . . ."