ARLA/CLUSTER: Estação de Ondas Longas RTE encerra a 27 de Outubro

[João Costa > CT1FBF]

RTÉ’s decision to cut long-wave radio service will sever a vital link
with Irish abroad

The Irish Times report that RTÉ has announced the imminent closure of
its longwave service, which was the last remaining broadcast radio
service still available to the Irish in the UK.

The move comes six years after the shutdown of its medium-wave
service. At that time, RTÉ officials assured the Irish abroad of its
commitment to them, and that the longwave service would continue.

The shutdown, announced with only one month’s notice, is scheduled to
take place on October 27th. The news is unlikely to cause a stir in
Ireland. RTÉ says 98 per cent of its listeners have other options.
Most of us used to spending our days online could be forgiven for
wondering why on earth this technology wasn’t mothballed years ago.

Who will be affected? The Irish in the UK, particularly the elderly
and vulnerable, will have a vital link with home permanently severed.
This is a group that is unlikely to protest. Many won’t even know
they’re about to lose their radio service until the day they go to
turn it on and it’s not there.

RTÉ has been broadcasting Radio 1 to Britain since 1932. Older people
rely on it as a valuable link with a country they left years ago; for
many, it is their last link with Ireland.

RTÉ says listeners in the UK can tune into the station on the internet
or satellite, but these solutions, which require cost and know-how,
will be inaccessible for many. RTÉ’s digital radio alternative, DAB,
has no reach in either Britain or the North. Longwave is not perfect:
it’s unusable at night, when its signal is overpowered by an Algerian
station sharing the same channel. But it keeps people connected during
the day, and many people use it to listen to GAA matches from home.

Last week Brendie O’Brien, chairman of the GAA in Britain, described
the impending shutdown as “a massive setback to the whole of the Irish
community”.

“We have a lot of old people who won’t have any access to Ireland
whatsoever once that [the longwave service] goes.” O’Brien described
Radio 1’s role in the lives of many emigrants as that of providing “a
home from home, and the shutdown would be depriving them of that.”

Read the full Irish Times article at
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/rt%C3%A9-s-decision-to-cut-long-wave-radio-service-will-sever-a-vital-link-with-irish-abroad-1.1961164