BROADCASTERS MARY WILSON and Áine Lawlor have signed off from RTÉ Radio 1’s Morning Ireland for the final time.

Today marks Wilson’s official retirement from RTÉ, and it is also the final time Lawlor will be in the presenter’s chair for Morning Ireland.

RTÉ will announce the new Morning Ireland presenters in the coming weeks. 

But while Wilson is leaving the broadcaster, Lawlor will continue to present The Week in Politics and will also feature across RTÉ’s coverage of the upcoming presidential election. 

Taoiseach Micheál Martin offered his best wishes to Wilson on her retirement and also wished the best of luck to Lawlor as she signed off from Morning Ireland.

He thanked them for their contribution to public service broadcasting.

Des Cahill presented both with flowers this morning as they bid farewell to the morning show.

Speaking on air, Cahill said: “Thank you for your professionalism, your dedication, your commitment to the important role in public service broadcasting.

“And most of all, you have been lovely colleagues and you’re two sound women, decent women, so thank you.”

Wilson thanked people who trusted her with their “traumatic” court cases in her time as a Legal Affairs correspondent and added that she feels “incredibly lucky” for the career she has had. 

“Thank you to the listeners,” said Wilson, “who continue to tune in.

“They tell us when we do something right. More importantly, they tell us when we do something wrong.”

Lawlor also thanked the listeners. 

‘Household voices’

Wilson, from Co Tipperary, has spent her career in RTÉ and joined the newsroom in Dublin in 1990.

In 1996, she became the station’s Legal Affairs Correspondent, becoming Editor in 2000.

She was the Millennium Journalist of the Year and won a number of Justice Media Awards.

In 2006, she also became the first presenter of the new Drivetime programme on RTÉ Radio 1.

In 2020 she returned to Morning Ireland, where she had worked as a reporter when she first arrived at RTÉ.

In 2023 she was inducted into the IMRO Radio Awards Hall of Fame.  

Speaking ahead of her retirement, Wilson said: “I know I am fortunate to be able to retire and I am looking forward to becoming a radio listener as opposed to presenter.”

She added that she is looking forward to “indulging my many hobbies”, such as hillwalking, cooking, “more trips to Kerry and above all more time with family and friends”.

Wilson said it has been a “privilege” to present news programmes on RTÉ and to “connect with listeners and to work with demanding, intelligent and dedicated colleagues who helped and challenged me every day to do better”.

Lawlor joined RTÉ in 1984 as a trainee journalist and became a presenter in January 1988.

She joined Morning Ireland in 1995 and presented the show for over 17 years.

She was awarded Best News Broadcaster of the Year at the PPI Radio Awards in 2012 and went on to be inducted into the PPI Hall of Fame in 2014.

In August 2013, she was appointed as presenter of The Week in Politics on RTÉ One.

In October 2020, Lawlor returned to Morning Ireland.

Ahead of her final show, she said it’s been a “privilege to be part of Morning Ireland for so many years”.

Lawlor joked that while she will miss the programme, she won’t miss the hours.

She added: “I’ll miss my great Morning Ireland colleagues, and ​most of all I’ll miss Mary, she’s a top-notch broadcaster and a fantastic woman.”

Elsewhere, Deirdre McCarthy, RTÉ’s Director of News & Current Affairs, remarked that both Wilson and Lawlor are “not just household names, they are household voices”.

McCarthy added: “At heart they have been and always will be journalists, and it is to their incisive, knowledgeable and challenging journalism that we owe them both a great debt, and thanks.”

Today also marked the final business news bulletin from journalist Petula Martyn, who leaves for a new role at RTÉ’s Mid West correspondent.