Fair City’s inclusion of a conspiracy theorist with right-wing views means the soap opera is “reflective of society”, a former cast member has said. 

The new character of Fergal wants immigration reduced, doubts climate change exists and believes the drift towards a cashless society is a sinister plot by bankers to control people.

Conservative journalist John McGuirk told The Hard Shoulder the character has been created by RTÉ in order to make right-wing views seem "a little bit abnormal or unusual".

But former Fair City actor Cillian O’Sullivan believes the show is just trying to portray Irish society.

“Soap opera, by its very nature, is reflective of society,” he said.

“Agree with those opinions or not, people like that exist.”

Some people online have called for the character to be written out, arguing the soap opera’s characters should not be making political points.

“The people that think that it’s wrong to showcase them in something like Fair City are people who are maybe living in an echochamber and they don’t want to be faced with the fact that people and these opinions do exist,” Mr O’Sullivan said.

“Talking about them and featuring them on the show, it’s not platforming them, it’s not showcasing them, it’s just reflecting society - which is what soap opera is designed to do.”

Others have said they are concerned Fergal could turn out to be a bad influence on Fair City viewers.

“I don’t think it’s going to [get] Margaret in Tullamore to go, ‘You know what? I might have a look at who were the Rothschilds? Oh, they control everything do they?’” Mr O’Sullivan said.

“It’s not going to have a huge impact. We’re not going to see a huge right-wing political party pop up, take power because Fair City had a character who said, ‘Climate change isn’t real.’”

Fair City airs on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday on RTÉ.

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Main image: Fair City's Fergal. Picture by: RTÉ.