The Taoiseach's special adviser on Northern Ireland has called on the media to allow those involved in the peace process "space" to conduct difficult negotiations.
Dr Martin Mansergh said it was not always conducive to a positive outcome to have the media camped outside "waiting to see who has moved a millimetre" during negotiations. The methods of the media in the week leading up to the suspension of the North's executive were "dramatic and not altogether encouraging," he told a conference on media ethics on Saturday.
Generally, the media had been supportive of the peace process, Dr Mansergh said, but there were exceptions. The campaign by one Sunday newspaper, the Sunday Independent, against John Hume "didn't contribute to the good health" of the SDLP leader. There was also "the odd war-horse" in the media "who might have been stimulating once, but is now more like a Chinese clock - right twice a day".
Dr Mansergh said media disinformation was "alive and well" in some quarters. He cited two separate reports about the IRA and Sinn Fein that had appeared in British newspapers in the past week. Both contained "not a scintilla of truth".
Some journalists had a tendency to take every hard-line statement at face value. "You have to have an open mind, and be prepared to adjust your opinions as the evidence requires," he advised.
The RTE presenter, Joe Duffy, said it was no revelation that the media were predominantly middle class. However, more needed to be done to attract larger working-class audiences. Newspapers such as The Irish Times, he suggested, should offer price reductions in disadvantaged areas, in the same way as they do for students.
"We constantly hear of promotions where newspapers are given away free - should that be targeted at less well-off areas?" Mr Duffy said. "Is it too much to ask that media empires should also have a social dimension and responsibility?"
It was important that journalists examine their own work, attitudes and language, he said.
RTE's economics correspondent, George Lee, spoke about the fallout from his criticism on air of the last Budget. Calling the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, a "Thatcherite" was "maybe a bit much", he conceded, but broadcast journalists had a duty to make a specialist area such as finance reporting relevant to the public.
Mr Lee predicted further revelations about the banks, and said he was aware of one "harrowing" case involving a prominent bank and paramilitaries. For legal reasons, this story could not be broadcast at present.
