Steve Blanda, once described as the safest man in radio, is back after taking a voluntary redundancy from 2UE following the Fairfax Maquarie merger earlier this year (opinion by Peter Saxon here).

However, he is about to return to the airwaves from next week on SmoothFM.

It was reported at the time of the merger that Blanda, who holds the record for the most ACRAS, hadn’t made the cut and risked being cast to the radio scrap heap just a short time after celebrating his 60th birthday.

Steve said, “I’ve loved smoothfm since its inception so it’s great to be part of the family.”

Management at MRN also decided not to authorise ACRA entries for former 2UE staff who no longer work at the network, even though they are eligible to enter, perhaps costing Blanda his 19th win. But now Blanda may have another GM who will sign his eligibility form to submit his work for this year’s awards.