Justice Minister Outraged Prison Service Recruitment Drive Not Targeting Lucrative 55-85 RTÉ Demographic

MINISTER for Justice Jim O’Callaghan has voiced outrage after discovering that part of a Prison Service recruitment budget was spent on The 2 Johnnies podcast rather than funnelled into RTÉ’s well-established 55-85 year-old demographic.

The sponsored episode, which reached tens of thousands of young people, featured prison staff chatting about their jobs in a relaxed interview with the Tipperary duo. However, according to the minister, this was €25,000 ‘flushed straight down the pan’.

“That’s a lot of money to spend on a podcast,” O’Callaghan said, neglecting to mention his department’s own signing off €60,000 earlier this year on a virtual tour of the Midlands Prison – €20,000 of which went on a CGI prison officer that could have been made on Microsoft Paint.

“Public money must be spent efficiently and carefully, ideally on radio shows young people actually listen to, such as Ronan Collins’s Daytime Gold or hip TV shows like Nationwide.”

Meanwhile, Garda Commissioner Justin Kelly pointed out that An Garda Síochána ‘didn’t pay a cent’ for its own recruitment-themed podcast appearance with The 2 Johnnies, “so put that in your hash pipes and smoke it.”