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CRAIG DOYLE IS to front a revival of the late-night chatshow Nighthawks as part of a major revamp of RTÉ Two television this autumn.
The Irish Daily Mail reports that the former BBC Sport presenter will front a Nighthawks-style show that will be broadcast once a week but will increase to three if successful. It is part of an overhaul of the television channel that it is felt is needed in light of hemorrhaging viewership and falling advertising revenue.
Nighthawks was first presented by Shay Healy when it was launched in 1988. It featured several future comedy stars including Kevin McAleer and Graham Norton. Ironically, it was launched as part of a major re-branding of RTÉ Two as Network 2. The station then became known as N2 between 1997 and 2004 when it reverted to RTÉ Two.
As part of the overhaul, the Mail reports that Aprés Match’s Barry Murphy will front a series called Murphy’s Pictorial Weekly with Maeve Higgins’ Fancy Vittles axed. The reality show Naked Camera is being moved to Thursday night on RTÉ One.
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Maybe it’s time to give junk status to Moody and other agencies?
If a country borrows money then it’s at their mercy. The only way to avoid them is not to borrow. Full stop.
But can you imagine the ‘budget’ we would have if the governent had to fully balance income and expenditure?. Forget about the 10 euro on childrens allowance being a concern.
Rating agencies should not be allowed to contribute to sensational journalism. It contributes to and accelerates market opinion. They should do ratings full stop. Not make statements that countries are at risk of a downgrade. How on earth can any EU country go to the bond market now and expect to have a good auction.
One has to feel there is some political agenda from inside Moodys.
Dear Moody’s, Standard & Poor et al….. Shut the hell up and jog on From, us.
Sick and tired of this lot and their self fulfilling prophecies.
So it will be a level playing field?
Completely agree with Cormac above.
Every time these agencies suggest that something may happen it causes panic, and makes the situation worse than it already may be.
They should just comment when they’re making a downgrade. They should warn those in the power in the countries that there is a risk to their creditworthiness, but leave it at that.
I know they want to make investors aware of potential problems, but it’s not helping the countries regain any sense of control of the situation, as I’ve said, it just worsens it.
Also see a political motivation – maybe my viewpoint is a bit simplistic here, but isn’t it better for currency speculators to have lots of smaller fluctuating currencies to one big steady one?
@Niall There is definitely something political going on. I’m very suspicious and wary of the rating agencies on a whole – when they choose to talk about things, when they choose to announce their downgrades.
Not quite sure regarding the currency, I’d like to agree as it would make sense. Currency, investments etc. are definitely not my strong point.
Not sure why is my name Kildare here after posting from an iPhone. TheJournal?
Hi Danny. This looks like a bug in our system – sorry! If the problem keeps happening, could you email hello@thejournal.ie? Thanks and apologies.
Pure sensationalistic attention-seeking on the part of the ratings agencies. How else can they make such sweeping statements about such a large number of countries? Within the Eurozone itself, we have countries like Estonia with a 6.5% debt to GDP ratio and Luxembourg with 19% in comparison to our place just short of the 100% mark, Greece’s 142% and Italy’s 146%.
Just a quick question for those of you with more knowledge than myself: With the euro situation getting worse by the minute and negative speculation making things even more difficult, will all of Ireland’s “best in class” behaviour have been for nothing? Just looking for honest opinions
I wouldn’t claim to know more than anyone else, but my feeling is that there was no benefit to Ireland in blindly propping up the Euro, at all costs. I think that the threat of default is about the only card we’ve got, and we should have used it judiciously to extract softer terms from the troika.
Instead, we’ve gone all in on the Euro’s survival through the policy decisions taken in the past few months – extended bank guarantee, etc. – so I sincerely do hope that it does survive, the consequences of its collapsing would be catastrophic.
have your say