Seven months after he left Liveline for retirement, Joe Duffy has said there are still things that animate and upset him. 

For decades, Irish people rang up to gripe with Joe about the problems in their lives. Some were of trifling importance, while others went on to dominate newspaper headlines. 

Speaking to The Pat Kenny Show, Mr Duffy said he still keenly “monitors” radio broadcasts and does sometimes wish he still had the mic in front of him. 

“You'd love to be instead of shouting at the radio, you'd love to be on the radio and doing it,” he explained. 

“I still get angry; I read Paul Williams' brilliant book recently, Crooks 2 it's called.

“And I read the chapter on Anglo-Irish [during the banking crisis], which mentions Liveline because they were giving out about Liveline. 

“And I was so angry at the end of it, I was so angry again because Paul Williams got the scoop.

“He got the tapes; I was just so angry at the end of it and I said to myself, ‘I'd love to revisit stories like that’.”

Joe Duffy. Picture by: Alamy.com.

Another thing that angers him is that there are still victims of the Troubles whose names are unknown outside their immediate family and social circle. 

After he published his book Children of the Rising, about the child victims of 1916, he decided to turn his attention to the Troubles. 

To this day, he receives letters about Children of the Troubles.

“We found, I think it was 168 children who've been killed in the Troubles,” he explained. 

“And then we got letters from other people saying, ‘Why didn't you mention my child?’

“And they'd say, ‘On that day in Northern Ireland, there were 14 people killed.’ 

“We were using newspapers, we were using Lost Lives, we got notices read out, thanks to the Primate of All Ireland, Eamon Martin. 

“He made an announcement that every mass in Northern Ireland, if anyone wants to get involved; librarians were brilliant.

“What I think is scandalous is that today, nobody knows the exact figure of how many people were killed in the Troubles. Nobody knows, nobody knows.” 

Joe Duffy pictured presenting his final farewell show in Stuidio 1 in RTÉ Radio Centre. Picture: Andres Poveda.

Another career highlight was when he helped reunite two sisters following four decades of separation. 

Surjit Nanda had visited Ireland many times over the years, successfully looking for her sister. 

It was when she contacted Livelive in 2015 that her luck changed. 

“The taxi driver at Dublin Airport rang in at five to three and he put this woman on the phone and said she was originally from India, but they're living in England,” Mr Duffy recalled. 

“And every bank holiday weekend, with one coming up, she used to come to Ireland to look for her sister that had disappeared 15, 20 years previously. 

“We found her within the day, which was incredible. 

“And they were reunited the following day; we found her because she was on a bus and the bus driver had Liveline on.”

Main image: Joe Duffy. Picture by: RollingNews.ie.