Radio presenter Colm Hayes has slammed new pay rules at RTÉ and said they have “gone silly.”
Colm used to be one of RTÉ’s highest paid presenters, but now fronts a Classic Hits FM breakfast show with Lucy Kennedy.
The radio DJ broke his silence on the departures of The 2 Johnnies, Doireann Garrihy and Jennifer Zamparelli from 2FM.
Speaking to the Sunday Independent about the new pay rules, Colm said: “It’s just gone silly. They’re reacting to public opinion.”
When asked if it was the right thing to do, he answered: “I don’t know, let’s see if it works.”
Colm who previously worked with 2FM boss Dan Healy admitted there were rows, but that there was also mutual respect.
Colm revealed Dan was a “good operator” but added that he is “running around in circles” now.
“Dan knows what he wants and goes for it. He doesn’t suffer fools. He will stand up in an argument. You will have stand-up arguments with him. He knows what he wants.”
Opening up on if he ever had any rows with Dan, he answered: “On programming policies, yeah. But professional ones.”
“In fairness to Dan, he would respect me for the years I brought and I respected him because he was the programme director of 2FM, but I might not have agreed with what was being done.”
The radio host also believes that “outside influences and pressures” on the station boss “are going to drag him left, right and centre”
The presenter first met Dan when he was working for Denis O’Brien at 98FM.
Picture Brian McEvoy
No Repro Fee
At the time, Colm was presenting the Strawberry Alarm Clock on FM104, the most popular breakfast show in the country at the time.
“Dan was the competition, so he was constantly trying to create breakfast shows to beat us and he never did,” Colm said.
Before leaving RTÉ, Colm was one of the only 2FM presenters to have gained listeners in the JNLR figures — up 5,000 for his weekend breakfast show.
Now, alongside Lucy Kennedy, he has grown the breakfast show audience at Classic Hits by 50pc in the past three years.
