Terry Prone's gripping new book recounts memorable days working with Longford's Albert Reynolds

Terry Prone - The Communications Clinic's leading advisor on communication, reputation management, and crisis handling - has been the go-to woman for many of Ireland’s most powerful figures.

While primarily associated with politicians, her clients come from a variety of industries, all seeking out her guidance often in a bid to improve skills such as how to answer unexpected questions, how to address a tough crowd, or, when controversy arises, how to emerge from a severe media storm with all the grace and charm of someone perfectly prepared for the weather.

Read more: ‘Jesus only had 12 followers, and look how far he got!’: Albert Reynolds Collection launches in Longford

Through her work in communications and speechwriting, Terry has witnessed historic moments from a different perspective, many of which she writes about in her new book ‘I’m Glad You Asked Me That.’

She has met and worked with many incredible individuals, some memorable for the right reasons like Albert Reynolds, others memorable perhaps because silence wasn’t one of their strong suits.

Speaking about one particular individual who made a less-than-gentlemanly impression, Terry says, “First of all, he had these hooded eyes and this great air of threat.”

Even if she had never divulged a name, or described those infamous eyes, most people would have likely guessed 'Haughey' just from the mere mention of the words, ‘great air of threat’, potentially the most accurate characterisation of the formidable former leader.

Continues Terry, “Haughey was always talking in a way that was very well informed but in a way that was seeking to be impressive rather than interesting. That was one of the things that was apparent to me in our very first studio interview."

“The other thing was that he had rigid self control. During the interview, I asked him about the affair with Terry Keane - now this was 50 years ago, nobody had ever said publicly that this affair was going on, although she was hinting about it every Sunday in her newspaper column."

“I asked him about everything, Col Gaddafi’s carpet being in his house, stuff like that, and he just stayed in rigid control, but when the cameras stopped, and when I said, “thank you, Mr Haughey,” he leaned across, clutched me by the knee and told me I was a rude b***h. I gather from talking to other people, including Pat Kenny, that this was something that wasn't unique to me, that he would stay in control, but afterwards, it was a different story. He once told Pat Kenny he was a complete b******s. Pat told me only that just last week."

When it comes to the good kind of memorable, one politician immediately comes to mind - Albert Reynolds.

Referencing the extract below, Terry recalls the day she was rushed over to Leinster House where she had to ghostwrite the speech Albert would deliver when announcing the Northern Ireland ceasefire, which he had spearheaded.

Albert was, she recalls in her book, “obsessed with peace,” an obsession that appeared to be triggered by an incident in his past he refused to elaborate upon when asked.

Read more: Fr Brian D’Arcy chats to the 'Longford Leader' about Albert Reynolds' letters

Speaking about Albert's latter years and the first time she noticed him behaving out of character, she recalls, “what struck me always when I got to work with him was how professional, competent, and confident he was.

“He had no problems with camera or scripts. Once he had gone through a script and was happy, he would go for it. That's why I always found it desperately sad that I did have one encounter with him where I went to his home with a camera crew to get him to do a script - I forget what about - but he wasn't himself at all."

“This had simply never happened before. Albert was the most courteous of people, and for the first time ever, he was snappy and contemptuous of the camera crew and me. In retrospect, I realised this must have been a first appearance of the Alzheimer's that he later suffered from.

“I've always been ashamed because I was just so enraged on my own behalf and on behalf of the crew, that I hadn’t taken a step back and tried to work out what the problem was here, what was causing this wonderful and clever man to behave so peculiarly? It made no sense to me at the time. It only began to make sense afterwards.”

The title of her book, ‘I’m Glad You Asked Me That’ is a nod to the infamous stalling tactic loved by politicians but loathed by Terry, as her company has long been blamed for advising figures to use it.

“We never told politicians to say that awful line,” she confirms.

“That response wasn’t the only one inaccurately associated with The Communications Clinic either. We were also told that we taught people to smile at the end of their sentence, and to say, ‘I didn't interrupt you, please don't interrupt me!’ all that sort of nonsense.

“Every time a cliché developed, we were blamed for it, even though we were constantly fighting against all of those kinds of formula responses.”

Terry's gripping new memoir 'I'm Glad You Asked Me That: The Political Years' is available now.