Colm Hayes has called for an end to the gender pay gap, and insisted that “most of the hard workers” in media are female.
The broadcaster worked for RTÉ 2fm for 10 years, before taking up his new post as programme director at Radio Nova six weeks ago.
In recent weeks, the gender pay gap within RTÉ has been widely discussed, and last week’s release of 2015 figures revealed that only three women had made the top 10 highest-earners list.
Speaking to the Irish Sunday Mirror about the controversy surrounding the pay gap, Colm said, “I don’t think it’s being blown out of proportion because I think it’s ridiculous that there is a gender pay gap.”
Ridiculous: Colm has hit out at the gender pay gap | VIPIRELAND.COM
“Some of the best producers and researchers are female, I don’t ever consider their gender, I just think they’re great workers and I feel they’re exactly the same. I never think, ‘Oh it’s a man or a woman, they’re doing more or less’. I just see them as hard workers.
“Most of the hardest workers are female, when I was doing the talk show on 2fm, my producer Alice was the one of the best producers I’ve ever worked with in my life.
“I think things should change now and what’s bizarre is, if they’re talking about transparency and they’re talking about it in gender, the pay gap, the person at the top is a woman.
“I’ve never met Dee Forbes, but I’ve so much respect for her, but she can’t sit over that and let that happen,” he said.
Taking a stand: Colm says most of the hardest working people in media are female | VIPIRELAND.COM
Colm also insisted that when men in the media get to the top, they get “really lazy”.
“There’s no reason why the Sharons [Ni Bheolain] or the Alices or the Jennys [Greene] shouldn’t be paid exactly the same, in fact an awful lot of them are much more talented than the guys.
“Once guys get anywhere in media they’re really lazy, they really are, women bring passion to life and in the media extra passion, guys don’t,” he explained.
Getting real: Colm says men in the media can get lazy when they make it to the top | VIPIRELAND.COM
RTÉ 2fm listeners were left devastated when Colm announced his departure from the station last year, but he’s happy that he made the decision.
“I’d left 2FM last August and took about six months off and I’d been talking to Nova. I do miss being on air a bit but I went on last Saturday without telling anybody at 9pm to midnight to get used to the studio.
“I loved it, Facebook went crazy, it was great, to say I’ll never be on air again, no I probably will be but just to get used to the whole thing as programme director takes time, getting to know everybody, we’ve big plans for Nova,” he added.
