Ryan has come a long way since days as a tea boy

THEY say it’s better to be born lucky than smart. Ryan Tubridy is more fortunate than most, being both lucky and smart – along with having the gift of the gab that has made him the biggest name in Irish broadcasting in the space of a few short years.

In little more than a decade, he has gone from being Gerry Ryan’s tea boy to the pinnacle of success. Tubridy is everywhere and he doesn’t seem to have an “off” button: hosting the Late Late Show on television, and now taking over Ryan’s radio slot next month on RTÉ 2fm, to make him the fourth highest-paid broadcaster in the country. The presenter earned €533,333 in 2008, the last year for which figures are available, a nearly 50% increase on his 2007 earnings of €366,867.

Tubridy was born lucky. A nephew of former government minister David Andrews and also of a former MEP, the late Niall Andrews, he first saw the light of day in Blackrock, Dublin in 1973 and went on to be educated at the prestigious and reassuringly expensive Blackrock College. Politics is in his blood, so it was no surprise he joined the Kevin Barry Cumman of Fianna Fáil while at UCD.