"We're about four seats ahead of radio"

"And sometimes the computer talks to this machine Hhere, the VT 90." Barry Cowan is recording a quick tour around the RTE Election Centre, a short piece to be used at the start of the election programme. By Fintan O'Toole

"Hold it Barry, we'll have to re-take that, it's not the VT 90, it's the VT 30." "Oh yeah," says Cowan, "the VT 30." Michael Heaney, directing operations in the Election Centre, surveys the scene. "Let's face it, Brian Farrell was the star in 1977 but this time the computer is the s~,!-r of the.show."

The election night programme is one show RTE has allways done well. The loss and gain of power is the most compelling spectacle that political life affords. Politicians make and unmake their images, they are thrown together in unlikely combinations and in the emotional atmosphere they can be made to say things that would otherwise remain unsaid. The role of RTE's front man, now filled by Brian Farrell is crucial. But the computer is encroaching.

The Election Centre is like a scaled down version of the NASA control room. At one end the telephonists sit, waitting on the end of the direct lines to the forty-one count centres. Next to them, a row of four tables, each with a journalist and a count assistant. The journalist writes an instant headline to be flashed up on the screen, the count assistant sets out the result in computer-digestible form and passes them on to be fed into the insignificant looking box at the end of the room. The VT 30 produces the graphics to illustrate the figures on screen.

It is a long way from RTE's first major election coverage in 1965, when John O'Donoghue's steel swivel chair colllapsed and dumped him on the floor just as pictures from the outside broadcast unit in Sligo were coming on the air. Another highlight of the coverage that year was the bottle of milk which appeared on the desk in front ofO'Donoghue as the night wore on. On no other night of the year would an ordinary milk bottle have been permitted on camera. The veil of the TV persona was allowed to drop, showing the mental dexterity and endurance of the election anchorrman. From then on the unflagging enthusiasm in the early hours of the presenters and commentators was to be the highlight of RTE's election night.

In 1965 it was all new. Eight hours of continuous live broadcasting, with four outside broadcasting units and a panel of experts in the studio amounted to a massive vennture for RTE. "Nobody knew what the public would think," says John O'Donoghue. "The political process had never been shown before. Nobody knew what tallymen were or if they would actually tell you the truth." For the first time young politicians trying to make a national reputation could be seen performing on their home ground. The exxperts had to lay their reputations on the ground, thinking on their feet and pushing forward the limits of speculation.

Every so often, the camera would turn from O'Donoghue or John Healy to a curly-headed economist bent over a pile of figures with a slide-rule and a pencil. Garret FitzzGerald was making his first appearance before the masses, as an "expert" rather than a politician.

"I don't think he would have been invited if we thought he had anything to do with Fine Gael." says O'Donoghue.

RTE's Director General, George Waters, introduces Garret FitzGerald, right, to the election computer.

"Anyway he kept to figures, and never got involved with discussing issues. But he was so expert and so fast talking and so knowledgeable that he was very impressive as far as the viewing public was concerned. People will be immpressed by an expert even if they don't necessarily underrstand what he's saying. That's not really true if you're running for election but he did become known as a name, a face, a man of knowledge." Following that appearance, FitzGerald was invited to stand for the Senate and was elected easily.

After 1965, the sophistication increased. Muiris MaccConghail was sent to study the BBC's coverage before the 1967 local government elections and edited RTE's coverage in 1969. The programme centred on outside broadcasts of the three party leaders, Cosgrave, Lynch and Corish, in Dublin, Cork and Wexford.

By 1973, the computer was already on the scene, makking predictions from it's lair in UCD. It was an ignominious debut. Ted Nealon pitted his considerable reputation as a weather forecaster and political tic-tac man against the machine and won. While the computer was distributing transfers on a rational party basis, Nealon was confounding it with geographical and personality factors, insisting that he was right and asserting mind over matter.

But even Nealon was upstaged by the defeated Taoiseach Jack Lynch who, against the wishes of his entourage, stayed in the studio well into the night. He had conceded defeat early to Liarn Cosgrave and, with the grace of a man relieeved of a burden remained on to wish Cosgrave well in his task of government. At four in the morning, well after his political colleagues had gone home, Lynch was still in RTE's hospitality room, drinking whiskey and chatting easily. The manner of Lynch's performance on election nigh t in 1973 strengthened his personal popularity enormously.

If the computer lost out in 1973, it almost caused a disaster in 1977 when it broke down completely. John Kelleher, who was editor' of the election programme at the time, admits that RTE was very fortunate that the election that year was such a landslide for Fianna Fail. "We were steeped that because Fianna Fail were such clear winners, the coverage was not really abou t the details of constiituencies but about the gain and loss of power." Brian Farrell was superb as minister after minister fell. Paddy Cooney and Justin Keating appeared to answer for their defeat; Conor Cruise-O'Brien stayed away. Liarn Cosgrave made a grudging concession that the people had decided against him. Michael O'Leary sat in the studio beside Noel Browne, deriding not the Labour Party for its failure but the Irish people for their stupidity, while Browne attacked O'Leary and the other Labour ministers for sacrificing their principles on the altar of Coalition.

The winners again were Jack Lynch and Garret FitzzGerald. Lynch again stayed for hours, getting into an intiimate and affectionate conversation with FitzGerald, payying fulsome tributes to the man who was shortly to become the leader of Fine Gael. It was FitzGerald's turn to be graccious in defeat, and he alone emerged with cred it from the Coalition's cataclysmic downfall. Brian Farrell, without the computer and flying by the manual, was in his element. When Charles Haughey appeared on camera from the Bollton Street count centre, Farrell, sensing the uneasiness of .Haughey's position, pushed him hard. "You must have mixed feelings about this. You didn't exactly break your back to get a large majority for Jack Lynch." Haughey blusstered, "I don't understand what you mean by that question," but Farrell's point was not lost.

Last June, RTE finally broke through with successful computer coverage, this time commissioned from CARA Data processing, with graphics developed from a sysstem first used by ITN in 1979, and adapted for PR with the help of ITN's Paul McKee. With vital struggles for fifth seats and cliff-hanging counts the easy access to and display of detailed information was central to the election programme and this time it worked. The personalities were still essenntial - Jim Kernmy and Joe Sherlock, John O'Connell and Sean Loftus, Dessie O'Malley holding the fort for Fianna Fail, while Charles Haughey refused to accept that he had lost the election - bu t the real drama was in the statistics.

For the technologists, 1981 was the big test. "Last year," says John Holmes of CARA, "we were keeping our fingers and toes crossed. This time we speak with a lot more assurrance. We're just keeping our fingers crossed."

On the night before the government fell, CAR A rang Liarn Miller, director of the election nigh t coverage to tell him that improvements to the system used in 1981 which CARA had been working on were now ready. The fall of the government within seven months of its election suited the computer very well. For the first time in the history of RTE's election coverage, the same constituency boundaries and the same electoral register would be in operation in two successive elections, making possible instant comparisons with June of percentage figures, numbers offirst preferences and overall party performances. This also allowed for predictions to be made on the basis of the first count results and the presumption that transfer patterns would be similar to those of the June election.

As well as this advantage, access to the computer was made more flexible for the presenters and commentators, the processing time was improved and a facility for showing the reason for any particular count was added to the grapphic displays. To this technology would be added the work of over two hundred and fifty people. Each constituency was assigned a reporter and a count assistant. Eleven constiituencies had direct live coverage from seven outside broaddcast units. The balance of all these elements would be effecctively in the hands of Liam Miller, with Joe Mulholland, editor of "Today Tonight" organising the contributions from political personalities in the studio and from the count centres.

At half past nine, Barry Cowan is back in the Election Centre beside the computer, telling the viewers that it is predicting eighty-five seats for Fianna Fail. When he has finished he says, "And now back to the studio and the man who dislikes computers, predictions and swings."

Back on screen Brian Farrell retorts, "I resent that, I do not dislike any or all of those things. But I do prefer the human person." Later when Tony Gregory is told that the computer is predicting that he will take a seat, Farrell cuts in, "He might prefer to depend on voters rather than on machines." The uneasy relationship between Farrell and CARA's calculator is becoming something of a needle match.

From the start the division is clear. Barry Cowan reads the results as the computer provides them and comments on the graphic displays. Brian Farrell deals with the human side, interviewing the politicians and experts, steering the commentary along with characteristic smoothness and masstery. For a long time, as the results come in thick and fast, Farrell takes a back seat. Computer displays fill the screen and Cowan is at the centre of things. The result from Dubblin North Central is announced and Charles Haughey is prooduced from the count. Joe Mulholland bursts in to the director's box to announce that Farrell is to interview Haughey and make sure to get him in to studio later in the evening. "Don't invite him - just say 'We will be seeing you later tonight of course'."

The amount of time given to discussion from the count centres is largely determined by what the computer is doing. A report on Dublin North West is extended by Liam Miller - "Hold the voice over, we don't have the computer yet." A few minutes chat is allowed after the returning officer announces the Galway West first count. The announcement was made first in Irish: the computer waits for it to be read in English.

The information is coming efficiently. Liam Miller announces happily, "We're about four seats ahead of radio." Radio has it's revenge. While the results from Dublin South are being displayed showing John Kelly on top of the poll, Kelly himself appears on another monitor, arriving in the lobby of the television centre. Suddenly, Michael Johnston appears on the monitor, leading Kelly away from a radio in terview. When the television is temporarily blacked out by an ESB power failure, John Bowman on radio suggests that the television should display a card poin ting out that coverage continues on Radio One. A minute later, the card is there.

Back on the air, and Farrell is back in the driving seat.

As the situation becomes clearer, and the gap between the announcement of results lengthens, he is in control again. Charles Haughey is in studio, Jim Gibbons is on the line from Kilkenny and the drama is real. The magic of the elecction night on television is that it throws politicians together at their most naked, in the highs of triumph and the lows of despair. Farrell brings out the drama, probing and testing with a sharpness that increases as the night goes on.

In 1965, when RTE started to cover elections on teleevision, no one was sure whether anyone would really wan t to watch the drama unfold late into the night. As middnight approached, the election team was uncertain whether it could justify carrying on until one o'clock. They rang the Gardai in Limerick and asked them to check in a squad car whether lights were still on in houses where the families would normally be asleep. The report was favourable and the programme went on. This time, everyone knew that the lights would still be on. •