Ms Deirdre McCarthy:

Political representation is constant. The political unit in Leinster House is made up of myself, two political correspondents and four members of the Oireachtas unit. "The Week in Politics" team is here also. We are here all the time and we meet Deputies and political party representatives all the time. Separate to that, we are regularly approached by special advisers, departmental and Government officials and a variety of people. An awful lot of it is just to keep in touch. Sometimes a political party might have a particular complaint to make about a programme or about an item which went out on the news. Sometimes it is a question about why a political party or Opposition party did not make the Dáil package on the six o'clock news. It will say another party made it and ask why it did not make it. We consider everything and it is balanced out. If it needs to be fed back into the system and into the newsroom, we do that at the morning meetings and, also, sometimes things have to be changed very quickly. An awful lot of representations are made. Sometimes it is a query. Sometimes it is a complaint, and sometimes it is trying to push a certain agenda. Everything has to be considered. We have to listen. It does not mean that we are going to agree or do anything about something but we must be open.