Hello, today I'm talking face to face to a man who's been contributing to the public and private life of this place throughout his entire adult life.

He's been a priest and a filmmaker. He's been a voice for people struggling with drug and alcohol addiction.

He found himself caught up in the back channels of the fledgling peace process.

And more recently, he's made significant

high profile contributions to the debates around policing and legacy. Dennis Bradley, welcome

to Red Lions. You've been a witness to the many twists and turns in the politics of Northern

Ireland for decades and we'll talk about all of that in a moment but I want to go straight back to

the beginning you're associated in the public mind of course with the city of dairy where we're

recording this conversation today but in fact you are from boncranah in duny gaul did you grow up

in a political household no no and yes no in that it wasn't a political household? No. No and yes. No in that it wasn't a political

household. It wouldn't have seen itself as a political household but my father was an avid

listener to radio and particularly to political debate but he wouldn't have ever

seen himself as being political. Yeah they were fin phenified, it was a phenophile household.

So I was conscious of that. I was also conscious that there was a group of people in the town who

were Finn Gave and that there was a history there somewhere. I wouldn't have been particularly

Ophay with it, but it was there. But it wasn't a political household, no. The elections would have come and gone, you know, the public elections to the Doyle and so forth.

And my father would have got quite excited by that and quite engaged by that.

But my mother wouldn't have hardly known who was whom.

And there was very little political discussion within the household

itself so I couldn't claim to come from a from a background or from a family of politicians

no. And did you pay any attention to the politics of Northern Ireland when you were growing

up or was that just another place? I think I came to it slightly well into my adult years,

...