Joe Duffy praises Liveline callers as he prepares for his final show

By Gráinne Ní Aodha, PA

Joe Duffy has praised the callers as he prepares for his last episode of RTÉ’s famous phone-in show on Friday afternoon.

The Ballyfermot broadcaster (69) is retiring after 37 years at the station, where he has presented Liveline for 27 years.

“It will go on. Liveline is on today, but it’s on on Monday as well,” Duffy told RTÉ radio ahead of his last programme at 1.45pm.

He added: “It’s the voices on Liveline; the less I talk the better, I find.

“We [the media] are still trusted. In the main we are still trusted, unlike other countries.

“They’re all part of our daily discourse, which is great and I hope that continues.”

Duffy joined RTÉ as a radio producer in 1989 and came to prominence as a reporter on the Gay Byrne Show.

He presented programmes such as Soundbyte before taking over Liveline from Marian Finucane in 1998, attracting some 400,000 listeners to the phone-in programme.

He said hearing his Dublin working-class accent on the national broadcaster had prompted some “green-ink letters” of complaint, some of which were internal.

Among Liveline’s most famous episodes were callers with thoughts on the television series Normal People, people sharing stories of corporal punishment in Ireland over the decades, and women talking about menopause.

Duffy said the only time he has been physically threatened during his tenure was over discussions about the closure of ‘headshops’, which sold drugs paraphernalia, where he said a man confronted him in a car park.

Asked about whether he would run for the presidency in the autumn, Duffy said: “I will not lose the run of myself.”

“I can see the Áras from Claddagh Green, I’d say that’s the closest I’ll ever get to it.”