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CHRIS DONOGHUE, THE long-serving Newstalk Breakfast co-host, is to take over George Hook‘s evening slot at the station, it’s been confirmed.
Hook will move to a new lunchtime show between midday and 2pm – apparently shelving those on-again-off-again retirement plans for at least another year.
Ivan Yates, who currently presents the breakfast news show at the Denis O’Brien-owned station, announced earlier this year he was planning to leave the station to go travelling with his wife.
Announcing their new schedule for the autumn today, Newstalk confirmed that political editor Shane Coleman would take over hosting duties on weekday mornings.
He’ll be joined in the breakfast lineup by crime journalist Paul Williams, TV3 news anchor Collette Fitzpatrick and former Irish rugby star Alan Quinlan. The new show will air from 7am till 9.
Vincent Wall will stay on as host of Breakfast Business from 6.30am to 7. Pat Kenny also gets an extra hour in the schedule shakeup, and will present his mid-morning show between 9am and midday.
Afternoons and evenings
Later in the day, Hook’s new show will debut between midday and 2pm, with Sean Moncrieff losing an hour, and broadcasting between 2pm and 4.
The Chris Donoghue-helmed show will be called Newstalk Drive, and will air between 4pm and 7. Sarah McInerney, political correspondent with The Sunday Times, will co-anchor.
According to the bumf about the new show on the station’s website, “listeners can expect an exciting and lively debate on the day’s news, with everything from business and technology to entertainment and sports on the table”.
There’ll also be some crossover with the Off the Ball sports team, with members of the panel joining Donoghue and McInerney on a regular basis from 6.30pm before beginning their own 7pm slot as normal. (Conflict within the station over the previous Off the Ball lineup wanting to move their start-time forward an hour, cutting into Hook’s time, led to that sports team resigning en masse in 2013).
Tom Dunne, who was moved to the nighttime schedule after Kenny’s arrival at the commercial station from RTÉ in 2013, will contribute to Newstalk Drive too, according to the station.
Roving reporter Henry McKean will also be making appearances in the programme. Previously, he’s been more closely associated with Moncrieff’s afternoon show.
“We’re delighted to welcome Colette, Paul, Sarah and Alan on board,” station editor-in-chief Garrett Harte said in a press release.
“They bring energy, curiosity and the dynamism to complement the great team of presenters we already have at the station.
We’re hugely excited at the entire team we have assembled, and we are particularly pleased that Colette Fitzpatrick has been able to join our breakfast team in addition to her ongoing commitments to TV3.”
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Stick to primary school teaching….
@Me_a_monkey: I thought it a good article. Might have helped to show the swimsuit/ advert of the times discussed. But a bit of a harsh comment monkey.
@Me_a_monkey: I disagree. Live and let live. Do what you want and don’t be defined simply by the day job. It’s a well written humorous yet serious piece. I enjoyed it. But Special K is not really a healthy food and it’s more about marketing and how people are constantly being manipulated to part them from their hard-earned cash. A complaint to the advertising standards authority might improve things.
@Me_a_monkey: It was just far too long and too loosely written. Needs editing and cutting back.
I think all this Instagranming of ‘body positivity’ and celebrating curves etc is all very well but the reality is you’re looking at Type 2 diabetes and all that goes with it. The Special K ad and the like are nonsense but there’s a danger with embracing our curves too. All the high Street and online plus size trends are a double edged sword. There are serious health reasons that nobody is supposed to be a size 22.
@Sinead Mooney: how dare you fat shame!! FAT SHAMER! Oh wait I shouldn’t use that word. PLUS SIZED SHAMER!
Brands that sell themselves as healthy but which are actually processed junk, should be banned. Eat natural.
@Alan Currie: so that is most brands, especially those that claim low fat.
After all the are low fat, but to stop the product tasting like cardboard they’ve added more sugar…. Which turns to fat in a person’s body due to the large amount as your body trys to store the excess sugar as fat since it can’t process the large amount at once.
@Barry Somers: you’ll find most man made foods that are low sugar are high in fat, and vice versa. There’s also danger of people using fat blocker pills, which also block the good fats from getting absorbed, omega 3 + 6 etc. A lot of people now switching to ketogenic diet.
@Alan Currie: Many natural foods too, to be fair! What nature doesn’t provide are foods high in both sugar and fat.
Lol.
Life is so short. Gonna have me bacon and eggs today. Then chase the dog up a hill.
Never had ‘Special K’ in my whole life of 60ish years. Live. Love. Eat. Move.
Oh and organic oats are all the breakfast cereal you need.
@willow moon: Good for you. But as we live in a world where we have confectionary products pushed on suggestible people from all directions and sugar added to everything (even baked beans), a little pressure to be healthy is probably no harm.
Really do not understand the point of this article. I get it’s poking fun at the underlying theme of the special k marketing. Is this another article on how certain advertising body shames women? This tired notion that it’s everyone else’s job to stop hurting your feelings? I really don’t get the purpose of this article.
@mark d: I would suggest re-reading it, you might get it the second time around
@Vocal Outrage: pleas explain it for me.
@Vocal Outrage: please explain it for me.
I’m sure I’d look great in that swimsuit! Drive the men wild!
I also grew up with the Diet Coke ad. Apparently they wanted to make another ad in that style and it was banned before it was even shot. We are now in the pc world. (There’s another advert). I think if you treat people like adults they act like adults and can make up their own minds about what they want. Maybe that’s why we are all still treated like children.
@Marcia Craine: but you have no problem with those adults being given false and misleading info/data?
How do you expect them to make up their minds if they are being lied to be the food industry?
@Barry Somers: when does it become an individuals responsibility to find and disseminate information for themselves. Also if people believe everything they see in an advert they deserve to be fooled.
This example really enhances her camel toe
What’s wrong with ambition, wanting to look better and feel better. If you want to commit suicide by over eating and indulging in harmful practices, go ahead, I don’t want to be paying for your diabetes medication or gastric bypass surgery. The reality is, being overweight is unhealthy and self limiting.
@Daniel Donovan: oh oh! Snowflakes gonna get you for that comment!
Most upset person here is yourself, so far, Mark. Does that say anything to you?
I can just imagine Waterford Whispers with this one. “Woman believes a full bodied red swimsuit body shames, goes to a beach in Spain and has a meltdown.”
If anything those swimsuits went out of their way to be modest and cover all the… bits. These days you see worse on a sunny July day in Grafton Street, and skimpier swimsuits held together with a bit of string and half a handkerchief on Termonfeckin beach. Personally I never look…
have your say