Yes, we do try to strike a balance for women’s voices in broadcasting

RECENTLY the National Women’s Council of Ireland made a submission to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland about what it claimed to be an exclusion of women from the airwaves.

The NWCI is worried about issues of fairness, impartiality and balance in the representation of women in news and current affairs programmes, both in making and presenting the programmes, and in contributing to them.

As the presenter and editor of a daily radio programme I’m interested in those issues too, not just because they are part of the intellectual bedrock of any news and current affairs programme: in making the best programme we can — my team and I don’t want to alienate or exclude, intentionally or unintentionally, anyone, irrespective of sex, age, colour or creed. But we have a commercial mandate to follow too — increasing audience to attract more advertising revenue — and if by taking heed of what the NCWI suggests we can find a way to get more women to listen to our programme then we at Today FM would be very happy about it.