Prime Time 10th March 2015

Sparks

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

Healy Rae would have been a better choice

No, just no. If the choice was between the head of Mothers against guns and Healy Rae, I'd chose the head of Mothers against guns as our representative. At least there you'd know you were getting an honest kick in the fork.

BattleCorp

I think we might be blowing this pile of RTE crap out of proportion.

Yes, we were all likened to criminals but I don't think the programme caught the imagination of the public. They would have been far more interested in the other topics on the programme.

I believe we aren't really much worse off than before.

All the emails etc. to politicians will be from our side. I can't see Joe Public contacting them in any numbers to ban our guns.

alfr

Hi,

New to the forum but have been watching since these proposed amendments were announced, ive signed the petition and put forward a submission (which pales in comparison to those who published theirs here).

Im a hunter not a target shooter but since the bubble burst (celtic tiger died) ive not been able to afford to take up target shooting but wish to do so in the future (even though the disciplines now compared to when i first thought about target shooting have since been restricted)

I watched tonights prime time just a few minutes ago (late shift) and im not surprised that its a 2008 hatchet job round 2.

Personally i dont think that William Egan was the right person for a debate (sitting here in hindsight without the prior details of the show) but he is more than accustomed firearms laws, unfortunately Deputy McGrath is a loud mouth who can only be silenced by another loud mouth with facts/figures which would have never worked even with the best loud mouth for our side as the presenter was bias, plus he probably went into the show without knowing who would represent the anti gun side (turns out he was 2 against 1)

Rte regardless of what was shown to them had their own agenda once again and as shown on prime time they made the law abiding firearms holder (who imo are vetted more than those in charge of children or people with special needs as well as many other professions) look like the scumbags who who are involved in drugs and gangland killings (imo) whilst using illegal firearms most of which are only allowed to be sold to defense forces/law enforcement


If im not mistaken it has been asked in the Dail as to how many people have firearms certificates which is yet to be answered (i think) but i believe sparks put the question to Niall Collins to ask the Minister of Justice via the Dail, i have yet to so an official number (maybe i missed it) from the government yet Prime Time quoted the number as been 144,991 which i find hard to believe as when i thought about myself having 3 firearms plus 3 friends the number totaled nearly 25 (target and hunting)

Can anyone tell me if CS Fergus Healy has been asked why he believes that people are trying to circumvent the law by applying for a .22lr pistol (which they are legally entitled to apply for) because no new applicant is entitled to apply for a CF pistol, it seems (imo) that CS Healy is making it out that those who apply for a .22lr pistol are breaking the law because they cant license a CF pistol (yet the courts have proven the guards wrong on this not to mention other applications)

Did any of those who represented shooters in front of the Joint Justice Committee know that they were meeting again tomorrow to discuss the proposed amendments?? Or was that kept quiet?

Im not on twitter but will be tomorrow to call out the trolls and hopefully make those ignorant of the current restrictions/law realise how ignorant they are but chances of anyone anti gun admitting they are wrong is like making a priest believe god doesnt exist even with facts presented to them (not a great analogy but it works)

garrettod

No point crying over spilt milk... Egan was the man on TV for whatever reason.

Sparks wrote: »

...Email sent to complaints@rte.ie:

Nice work. I trust plenty of others here will help ensure that RTE's Complaint's Department will be busy for quite some time to come.

patsat wrote: »

What are the chances of something like this ever getting some time on Tonight with Vincent Browne ?

Good question.

If anything was going to be done, it would have to be fairly quickly though, while the item is still "news worthy" and there's fresh information to be presented to viewers.

badaj0z

BattleCorp wrote: »

I think we might be blowing this pile of RTE crap out of proportion.

Yes, we were all likened to criminals but I don't think the programme caught the imagination of the public. They would have been far more interested in the other topics on the programme.

I believe we aren't really much worse off than before.

All the emails etc. to politicians will be from our side. I can't see Joe Public contacting them in any numbers to ban our guns.

I totally agree with this. The public at large would have taken very little notice of this programme. There was nothing in it to affect most people and it was not interesting to watch. The only possible downside is if the AGS/GS think that it has had an effect and feel bolder because of this.

B412

I feel after last nights proformance by Egan we might as well put our hand in the air, he is NOT the man for the job

yubabill1

Sent to complaints@rte.ie;

Sir/ Madam

I was very upset by your report on proposed new firearms legislation last night, which portrayed people like myself – licensed firearm holders – as potential rampage murderers, despite my having undergone substantial background checks, provided character referees, access to my personal medical record and agreed to access to my home at any time by Gardai and also having committed no criminal offences whatsoever.

The programme contained a piece with Superintendent Fergus Healy, who was allowed mention his fear of a gun culture emerging, while demonstrating handguns which can no longer be licensed by new applicants under 2008 legislation. The only handgun in the piece which can be licensed today by a new applicant was the one Superintendent Healy “approved”. This clearly presented a biased impression of gun ownership.

The report also failed to mention the origination of the proposed ban, which came only after a large number of court cases were lost by Gardai regarding firearms licensing following 2009 legislation born out of round table agreement between stakeholders, greatly strengthening applicant suitability and firearms storage regulation.

The report indulged in scaremongering around gun murders – citing a firearm stolen in ROI used in the murder of the Corbally brothers, which is in dispute1 – despite a background of multiple-year falls in gun crime2, gun seizures3 and a 50% reduction in thefts of legal firearms between 2010-2013 according to CSO statistics.

1. http://www.sportscoalition.org/kildare-radio-interview-512015/
2. http://www.thejournal.ie/frances-fitzgerald-garda-commissioner-1522872-Jun2014/
3. http://www.thejournal.ie/firearms-seized-1583874-Jul2014/

Grizzly 45

Sparks wrote: »

You might be giving people too much credit - when the Prime Time producer called me back in February, I told her right at the start about those complaints. She didn't even know about them.

You problay ended up talking to some jobs bridge intern dogsbody researcher who is 9th gen in that position.But that's the nature of the beast too,destroy people and Iives and move onto the next victims and newsworthy event.Only thing they will remember is the one that gets people fired Or the massive lawsuits.

Grizzly 45

Sparks wrote: »

No, just no. If the choice was between the head of Mothers against guns and Healy Rae, I'd chose the head of Mothers against guns as our representative. At least there you'd know you were getting an honest kick in the fork.

I meant that you don't send a cute little toy dog to a pit bull dogfight.Egans home is the court room not a bear pit that is a TV studio debate.What was needed there was somweone just a s mouthy and vicious and well up to the media tactics someone like Healey Rae.Someone who wouldn't have thought twice to kick me grath in the nuts about his hypocrisy on smoking lecturing about gun bans.Use the right tool for the job.

oldtart

Predictably predictable outcome. I even cringed myself seeing the deer jumping three feet into the air. Why the feck did the deer men let them film that?

Nekarsulm

Healey Rae would have been able to prevent Finian running away with the show, problem is, not able to stop his own showmanship/mouth running away, either.
A few remarks about how rural dwellers should be allowed drive home with 3 or 4 pints, and credibility would be blown.

tikkahunter

oldtart wrote: »

Predictably predictable outcome. I even cringed myself seeing the deer jumping three feet into the air. Why the feck did the deer men let them film that?

Because that's real life like it or not.Public won't really give a dam about that programme they probably forgot most of it by the time the rape case was finished and they will just move on to the next scandal next week.The biggest problem is someone like finian mc grath being on that comitee he is totally biased , the prick knew the facts but still peddles lies.

tikkahunter

Nekarsulm wrote: »

Healey Rae would have been able to prevent Finian running away with the show, problem is, not able to stop his own showmanship/mouth running away, either.

We need need another mouthpiece there talking over him and putting him down he had it to handy ,golden gee was was totally biased as well

tomtucker81

Is the programme on you tube yet?
I can't watch the rte player on my phone and i want to see it again.

Sparks

BattleCorp wrote: »

I think we might be blowing this pile of RTE crap out of proportion.

It's a sounding board for public opinion. The Minister doesn't see a negative reaction to last night, it might influence her decision, make her think that a ban has no negative side effects in terms of votes. Likewise for the independent TDs looking at the next election but with a more pronounced effect as they don't have a party whip restraining them from changing positions quickly. If the public looked at last night and went "meh" and we're complaining loudly about it through the appropriate channels and to our TDs and in public, that will be noticed and would be beneficial in the long term.

Mind you, some loud shouty eejit goes off on one and he or she will wind up doing more harm than good, so civility is still required. Just sayin'...

extremetaz

Complaint sent - above all else, the blantently, intentionally, biased nature of the whole thing shocks me (and I was expecting it to be bad!) - it's every bit as bad as anything you'd see in the Star or similar. How can people be expected to believe anything that comes out of any RTE media after that??? (not that I placed much weight on it to begin with but my GOD!!)

knockon

complaints@rte.ie

Dear Sir/Madam,

I wish to make a complaint about Prime Time on Tuesday March 10th. The programme was poorly researched, lacked any investigative reporting and was delivered in an absolute biased manner by the reporter and studio anchor. I will explain why.

Reporting

The programme was titled "Guns In Ireland" never reported on the fact Ireland has the strictest gun ownership in the EU. Barry Cummins saw it fit not to mention the licensing process for Target Shooters and the extensive application form we have to fill out to satisfy An Garda Siochana. He seemed to be in awe of Chief Superintendent Healy and did not even to challenge his remarks.
The programme immediately linked licensed firearm ownership by law abiding citizens with criminals and thugs using illegal firearms and individuals using firearms who are not permitted to do so. Placing a distressed Mrs Cambell on the murder of her Son, Anthony by criminals in the same programme was noting short of sensationalism on the part of the programme makers. There is no link between licensed sporting firearms and criminality.

Studio

Miriam O Callaghan was completely biased in her delivery and interaction with Mr Egan. and did not permit equal time and equal opportunity
for both interviewed guests to make their case, with Deputy McGrath
being allowed to ignore the host and speak over Mr.Egan on several
occasions for a significant period of time. Mc Grath was allowed to bulldoze both O Callaghan and Mr Egan with ease and talking incessantly with unfounded statements.

Research

I personally emailed the Deputy Editor, Paul Ferris on Monday March 9th and informed of the following.....

Dear Paul,

Please excuse me for writing to you again. I understand that the feature on firearms licensing takes place on Tuesday night. I assume that you are in possession of critical information supplied on Tuesday 3rd March by Minister Francis Fitzgerald in reply to Dail Questions by Deputy Niall Collins. The data she supplied to the Dail is the PULSE information supplied by AGS and is a list of Firearms stolen between 2010 and 2014. In regard to the figure of approximately 1700 firearms that were listed by the Gardai as having been stolen from 2010 to 2014 raised interesting written questions in the Dail on Tuesday this week, which saw an info dump of raw data from PULSE regarding the figures. Here's the breakdown.

The breakdown which transpired upon the release of the raw data by the Minister in the Dail on March 3 to include hundreds of items which are not legally firearms in Ireland. In other words the whole basis for the proposed ban is based on these incorrect data figures by An Garda Siochana. Despite Mr Ferris having this critical information it was not delivered on this the leading investigative current affairs programme in the State.

I am absolutely incensed at the treatment of law abiding sport people and how the Prime Time programme represented the story without few facts by RTE and intend to make a formal complaint to the BAI. Based on the programmes previous indiscretions and fines by the BAI one would have assumed that a report of this nature would have been properly researched and delivered.

Yours sincerely,

yubabill1

Today's media littered with IRA sex abuse and inadvertent temporary legalisation of drugs.

Saw nothing about firearms licensing.

We need to keep pressing our case in this vacuum.

well done to rte complainants.

knockon

extremetaz wrote: »

Complaint sent - above all else, the blantently, intentionally, biased nature of the whole thing shocks me (and I was expecting it to be bad!) - it's every bit as bad as anything you'd see in the Star or similar. How can people be expected to believe anything that comes out of any RTE media after that??? (not that I placed much weight on it to begin with but my GOD!!)

I agree with you. It was terrible top watch. The piece was appalling in research, delivery and presentation. The deer shoot was a nothing for want of better words. Mick Topes interview was shredded to pieces by all accounts. Not enough range "time" and absolutely no look at the licensing process. Then have Pinocchio in the Phoenix Park giving out the drivel and lies that he has been quite accustomed to without any question or "hold on, aren't you the guys that issue licenses?" from Cummins. Then the studio "debate" was disgraceful. Miriam O Callaghan allowed McGrath to chatter away. We needed a shouter there last night to call McGrath a grandstander and demand to be heard and keep talking. We did not have the right guy there. He should not have accepted the invitation.

hexosan

Did I imagine it or did Healy say that criminals are only using a pool of 25 guns. ???

Nekarsulm

hexosan wrote: »

Did I imagine it or did Healy say that criminals are only using a pool of 25 guns. ???

Yes, those were his exact words. Finian didn't explain who the hell has the other 149,975 illegally held guns.........

hexosan

Nekarsulm wrote: »

Yes, those were his exact words. Finian didn't explain who the hell has the other 149,975 illegally held guns.........

So basically that not even one gun per county. They cant tell how many illegal firearms are out there, they cant say if stolen firearms have been used in crime but he can say with all certainty that all the criminal in the country are sharing only 25 guns to commit all their murders.

mrbrianj

Is CS Healy a member of the IOC?

His definition of "Olympic Standard" and the Olympics definition are completely different.

Maybe he should stop telling fibs to Oireachtas committees and RTE reports and go out a catch the criminals using guns - there is only a pool of 25 of them after all.

Sparks

Nekarsulm wrote: »

Yes, those were his exact words. Finian didn't explain who the hell has the other 149,975 illegally held guns.........

Again with the 150,000 figure which only shows up once in one appendix to the Small Arms Report 2007, with no reason given there for its selection, and which scares the bejaysus out of Joe Public who thinks it's a real number.

Yeesh.

Nekarsulm

hexosan wrote: »

So basically that not even one gun per county. They cant tell how many illegal firearms are out there, they cant say if stolen firearms have been used in crime but he can say with all certainty that all the criminal in the country are sharing only 25 guns to commit all their murders.

well, probably those 25 guns the Garda mentioned, are the one's Paul Williams claims are held by criminals acting as "Armourers", who hire them out at a daily rate to other criminals.
If the Gardaí know these guns, and they obviously know the core group of criminals, its a disgrace that rather than intensify their efforts to locate and remove them from circulation, they choose to go on a campaign to limit legally held and licenced sporting guns.

Sparks

mrbrianj wrote: »

Is CS Healy a member of the IOC?
His definition of "Olympic Standard" and the Olympics definition are completely different.

He'd have to be ISSF-qualified, not IOC-qualified (the IOC delegates the individual sports stuff for the Games to the international governing bodies, in this case the ISSF).
(And he's not, there's only a few of us in Ireland with ISSF judges licences and he is most certainly not one of them).

(And did I mention six times already as an ISSF judge that he's wrong?)

Sparks

Nekarsulm wrote: »

If the Gardaí know these guns, and they obviously know the core group of criminals, its a disgrace that rather than intensify their efforts to locate and remove them from circulation, they choose to go on a campaign to limit legally held and licenced sporting guns.

Campaigns cost money.
And politicians have been cutting the Garda budget, freezing recruitment, closing stations, slashing training budgets and hobbling them for the last few years in the name of Austerity.
I'm not happy with last night (well, duh), but I still blame the Dail for gun crime more than I blame the Gardai.

Which is probably why TDs like McGrath so annoy me by standing up and claiming it's someone else's fault...

Grizzly 45

The AGS have hauled in alot more in the still ongoing Operation Anvil which is seemingly still well funded,so 25 exrea guns in this criminal pool should be not much of a problem.

I get a feeling there is a whole lot more explaining going to be needed from Primetime as to why there were two such mismatched opponents...The more I think about this it makes no sense as to objectivity.Mr Shouty Vs Mr intellectual facts and figure man is more American chat show zoo TV.Not somthing a "respectable" political programme would engage in??[EG] Hayley Rae Vs Mc Grath would make more sense for "entertainment",as heard on a radio interview awhile ago but not for serious discussion.
Was there someone else supposed to meet Egan on an intellectual and statistical level and couldnt make it and they pulled in Mc Grath as next option????

Grizzly 45

tikkahunter wrote: »

.The biggest problem is someone like finian mc grath being on that comitee he is totally biased , the prick knew the facts but still peddles lies.

And that can,belive it or not work to our favour too.We can say if this report comes out that he had an undue influence on it and was a pronounced anti gun/hunter bigot from the word go and should never have been on the comittee either as his views were slanted from the word go,same as if there was an utter pro gun TD /Senator [a UnicornI know ] there as well.This comittee is supposed to be impartial and consider facts and come up with a reasoned submission,which if the scuttlebutt and partial statement paragraph on the subject from Des Crofton in this months ISD is to be belived they are willing to find a compromise solution,but the AGS are just digging in like donkeys and saying "NO its our way or no way at all."

Sparks

There's no rule about committee members being pro or anti a topic; just so long as the committee itself is fair overall. So if some are pro and some anti, that's no big deal.

It's when McGrath brings up a statistic on air that he was told was wrong last week, and when the show doesn't correct him even though they were told last week, that there's an unfair bias at work.