Marian Finucane - hours v. salary - true?

donaghs

Reading about all the RTE salaries recently one name stood out in particular. Marian Finucane has been one of the highest earners in recent years and was paid €570,000 last year.

While I think she's ok on the radio, I was surprised at this as I didn't think she was as high-profile or as popular as other RTE broadcasters (Pat Kenny, Gerry Ryan, Derek Mooney, Ryan Tubridy, Miriam O'Callaghan etc).

Also, if I'm not mistaken, she currently is only on the radio 4 hours a week?!
11am-1pm Saturday and Sunday
http://www.rte.ie/radio1/marianfinucane/

That's quite a good deal. Or am I missing something?

mike65

Its a fantastic deal! Of the RTE "money-bags" she is easily the best paid for what she does. Its not like her shows even require a huge amount of prep unlike Pat Kennys radio prog for which he has to be up to speed with interview subjects and discussion topics.

GerardKeating

donaghs wrote: »

Reading about all the RTE salaries recently one name stood out in particular. Marian Finucane has been one of the highest earners in recent years and was paid €570,000 last year.

While I think she's ok on the radio, I was surprised at this as I didn't think she was as high-profile or as popular as other RTE broadcasters (Pat Kenny, Gerry Ryan, Derek Mooney, Ryan Tubridy, Miriam O'Callaghan etc).

Also, if I'm not mistaken, she currently is only on the radio 4 hours a week?!
11am-1pm Saturday and Sunday
http://www.rte.ie/radio1/marianfinucane/

That's quite a good deal. Or am I missing something?

This assume this is/was all she was paid for, does she do some TV as well.

Also the media makes a big fuss about how much the stars are paid, but does not bother to report who much advertising revenues they generated for this salary...

ateam

The Sunday morning programme requires very little research for her - it's essentially a discussion on the weeks events. All she needs to do is keep up to date with current affairs. Her salary is outrageous.

ateam

GerardKeating wrote: »

This assume this is/was all she was paid for, does she do some TV as well.

Also the media makes a big fuss about how much the stars are paid, but does not bother to report who much advertising revenues they generated for this salary...

It doesn't excuse the high salaries.

Rondolfus

GerardKeating wrote: »

Also the media makes a big fuss about how much the stars are paid...

Marian finucane....star..... Am i missing something??

GerardKeating

ateam wrote: »

It doesn't excuse the high salaries.

It does if the advertising more that pays for the salary.

Sleipnir

GerardKeating wrote: »

Also the media makes a big fuss about how much the stars are paid, but does not bother to report who much advertising revenues they generated for this salary...

Does RTE report on how much each each star makes for them? They are the media too you know.

jdivision

Her salary's ridiculous but she doesn't just work on the radio, some of the stuff is pre-recorded during the week and she does go in during the week I'm told by people who work there. Having said that whatever Eamon Dunphy's on (about E250k apparently) is ridiculous too, Marian by contrast has a big loyal audience.

ateam

jdivision wrote: »

Her salary's ridiculous but she doesn't just work on the radio, some of the stuff is pre-recorded during the week and she does go in during the week I'm told by people who work there. Having said that whatever Eamon Dunphy's on (about E250k apparently) is ridiculous too, Marian by contrast has a big loyal audience.

Her Sunday programme requires no prior research as it's live and basically a chat with 6 other people.

DublinWriter

GerardKeating wrote: »

It does if the advertising more that pays for the salary.

...which in turn we pay for as consumers of the goods and services being advertised.

donaghs

The ad revenue from the weekend afternoon slots is an interesting "if". Would presumably be based on listnership figures. Are these available for each radio program?

Would also be interesting to then compare this with the Today FM or Newstalk, and how well they pay their broadcasters.

GSF

donaghs wrote: »

Or am I missing something?

Yes you are missing the 3 months holidays she gets every year

donaghs

GSF wrote: »

Yes you are missing the 3 months holidays she gets every year

That's true. I didn't factor that in either. She had 3 months off in 2010, due back this September apparently.

speedboatchase

We need her, if we didn't pay her €750,000 a year she'd be pinched by top UK broadcasters like the BBC and ITV, then we'd be fooked! :rolleyes:

Lenny Lovett

Sleipnir wrote: »

Does RTE report on how much each each star makes for them? They are the media too you know.

It's irrelevant how much advertising revenue is generated by their programme. They are there primarily to present a programme not to sell advertising. The way RTE reports it's accounts there is no breakdown of ad sales v salaries paid equally there is no breakdown of how much licence fee money is paid out in salaries/fees etc.

jdivision

How do you know how much advertising they would get without her? I mean, a lot of places would advertise on RTE anyway.

Rubik.

donaghs wrote: »

The ad revenue from the weekend afternoon slots is an interesting "if". Would presumably be based on listnership figures. Are these available for each radio program?

Would also be interesting to then compare this with the Today FM or Newstalk, and how well they pay their broadcasters.

I think it would be more interesting to see if there was a drop in revenue over the period that Rachel English and Charlie Bird presented the show. I'd imagine there was little, if any, fall off and certaintly not enough to justify Finucane earning multiples of the other two's salaries. Which begs the question - why does she?

Head of RTE Radio, Claire Duignan, claimed last week that RTE presenters must accept the boom years are over "and they need to get in step with the drive down to more modest remuneration". I wonder, what size of a salary does Ms Duignan earn.

coletti

There is no doubt that Marian Finucane is good at what she does, but her talent is not exceptional.

Working it out, lets say she works 39 out of 52 weeks a year, thats 39 weeks @4 hours broadcasting per week, or a total of 156 hours a year, for which she is paid €570 000.

Thats an hourly rate of €3654.

In other words, for presenting two shows per week, two hours on Saturday and two hours on Sunday, she is paid, each week, €14616.

I wonder is it possible to find anyone in, for example, the BBC who is paid, for radio broadcasting, at the rate of €3654 per hour?

Lenny Lovett

Rubik. wrote: »

I think it would be more interesting to see if there was a drop in revenue over the period that Rachel English and Charlie Bird presented the show. I'd imagine there was little, if any, fall off and certaintly not enough to justify Finucane earning multiples of the other two's salaries. Which begs the question - why does she?

Because they trot out this silly excuse that if they [RTE] don't pay her half a million a year an opposition station will and she would jump ship. Now, there's no way Newstalk - the only possible other Irish station that would be interested in her - would or, indeed, could pay her such a fee. So it's all a smokescreen.

Rubik. wrote: »

Head of RTE Radio, Claire Duignan, claimed last week that RTE presenters must accept the boom years are over "and they need to get in step with the drive down to more modest remuneration". I wonder, what size of a salary does Ms Duignan earn.

I seriously doubt Claire Duignan is on a salary anywhere near that of her top five 'talent'.

Rubik.

Lenny Lovett wrote: »

I seriously doubt Claire Duignan is on a salary anywhere near that of her top five 'talent'.

No, probably not. But Cathal Goan did earn 326,000 euro last year and I am curious to know if RTEs management were as generous to themselves as they were to Marian & Co. over the boom years.

FlutterinBantam

GerardKeating wrote: »

It does if the advertising more that pays for the salary.

Don't be talking rubbish.

bytey

all of these useless parasites need to be fired .

stars me h0le ..

actually i rephrase that - brown stars me h0le

this would do just a good a job as any of these overpaid wasters

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws58s9wzYsA

FlutterinBantam

bytey wrote: »

all of these useless parasites need to be fired .

stars me h0le ..

actually i rephrase that - brown stars me h0le

this would do just a good a job as any of these overpaid wasters

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws58s9wzYsA

:eek:

What!!

'Stars me brown hole 'surely.

Bucked are we?

mike65

Pat Kenny speaks out about pay and conditions

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/were-paid-peanuts-compared-to-soccer-stars-says-pat-kenny-2325322.html

"Well, I always smile to myself about the salaries issue. Back in the Eighties, Gaybo was earning in real terms more than everyone is earning in RTE now. So the idea that these are on Celtic Tiger rates of pay is not really true."

He said that RTE had to "incentivise" its stars.

"I often wonder why there isn't the same fuss over the salaries paid to footballers like John O'Shea, earning more in three weeks than Marian Finucane earns in a year.

"There is a double standard there. These people put themselves on the line, they entertain the nation week in, week out, and yet they are paid a trivial amount compared to footballers.

Astonishing just astonishing

Lenny Lovett

Yeah Mike. As I said on another forum, Kenny and Co have the cheek to accuse the Politicians of being out of touch? Did nobody tell him that we don't pay a tax towards the premiership footballers salaries like we do for these people?

tbh

coletti wrote: »

There is no doubt that Marian Finucane is good at what she does, but her talent is not exceptional.

Working it out, lets say she works 39 out of 52 weeks a year, thats 39 weeks @4 hours broadcasting per week, or a total of 156 hours a year, for which she is paid €570 000.

Thats an hourly rate of €3654.

In other words, for presenting two shows per week, two hours on Saturday and two hours on Sunday, she is paid, each week, €14616.

I wonder is it possible to find anyone in, for example, the BBC who is paid, for radio broadcasting, at the rate of €3654 per hour?

a 30 second ad during her show costs 720 euro - that's the 600 standard weekend slot, plus a 20% surcharge for the MF show. Lets say there's 10 minutes of advertising per hour, that works out at 10 * 60 = 600 / 30 = 20. 20 30 second ads at 720 per ad is 14,400 per hour, and 28,800 for two hours, or 2,246, 400 for her 156 hours a year.

2,246,400 - her salary of 570,000 = 1, 676, 400.


Her surcharge alone covers 374,400 of her salary, and that doesn't include the cost of sponsorship which is in addition to ad revenue.
Now, I'm not saying that RTE couldnt charge those rates if they didn't have Marser in the slot (although plenty seem to be happy to pay the 20% surcharge), but even allowing for the fact that possibly there wouldn't be ten mins of ads per hour, those figures would make you think.

no?

Rubik.

tbh wrote: »

Now, I'm not saying that RTE couldnt charge those rates if they didn't have Marser in the slot.

no?

But thats the key point. It would only make sense to pay Finucane what she is being paid if is she was the only one who could command that much ad revenue in that time slot. Rachel English and Charlie Bird have shown over the summer that they are more than capable of doing the programme( better able, imo, but thats down to personal taste). I don't have any JNLR figures to back me up, but I doubt they have lost many listeners.

tbh

Rubik. wrote: »

But thats the key point. It would only make sense to pay Finucane what she is being paid if is she was the only one who could command that much ad revenue in that time slot. Rachel English and Charlie Bird have shown over the summer that they are more than capable of doing the programme( better able, imo, but thats down to personal taste). I don't have any JNLR figures to back me up, but I doubt they have lost many listeners.

That is a very valid point. I would wonder tho, if Marion went to newstalk, would/could they charge a similar rate? I'd suspect they could, or maybe about 90% of it. If they could, they could afford to pay MF a similar salary and it'd be a huge coup for them. Again, I'm not saying I'm happy with rte paying her so much, but from a business point of view, the figures add up IMO

Rubik.

tbh wrote: »

That is a very valid point. I would wonder tho, if Marion went to newstalk, would/could they charge a similar rate? I'd suspect they could, or maybe about 90% of it. If they could, they could afford to pay MF a similar salary and it'd be a huge coup for them. Again, I'm not saying I'm happy with rte paying her so much, but from a business point of view, the figures add up IMO

I don't doubt it would be a coup for Newstalk. But in the past few weeks we have seen presenters going in the opposite direction, mainly due to the differences in pay and conditions between RTE and Newstalk. It has to be remembered that Newstalk has yet to make a profit and would offer none of the security that RTE does.

FlutterinBantam

No they don't.

First of all the slot time is important.

Given the slot time ,people will tune in,and as others have said there are several
others who can draw the same audience.

Let's look at it this way.

The national broadcaster will command a good fee for ad rev. between 1100 and 1800 on the weekends.

Put out a good programme and the rest is up to the presenter.

The presenters will influence this, but not to the extent MF is paid.

Commercial rates will apply and I cannot see,cannot see, MF commanding a comparative salary scale in any of RTEs competitors

Cannot see it

That should be the comparator, it's fairly basic economics.

tbh

FlutterinBantam wrote: »

No they don't.

First of all the slot time is important.

.

Ok flutt hypothetical. Newstalk poach mars and stick her on mon-thurs, 9 to 10. Do you listen to by at that time now, and would you move if they stuck her on at that time? Or would you stick with your mate dublin John ?
Would you move if they stuck her on at the same time as PK? And if she legged it to nt and was in direct competition with, say, myles dungan, who Would you pick?

The presenter isn't always incidental. Mind you there are only three I'd follow no matter what - PK, Mars and matt cooper

FlutterinBantam

tbh wrote: »

Ok flutt hypothetical. Newstalk poach mars and stick her on mon-thurs, 9 to 10. Do you listen to by at that time now, and would you move if they stuck her on at that time? Or would you stick with your mate dublin John ?
Would you move if they stuck her on at the same time as PK? And if she legged it to nt and was in direct competition with, say, myles dungan, who Would you pick?

The presenter isn't always incidental. Mind you there are only three I'd follow no matter what - PK, Mars and matt cooper

presenters are important, always said that, but: their contention that somehow their salary should be related to ad revenue brought in is ridiculous.

There are numerous parameters which govern that.

Presenters salary should be, as in any capitalist society a measure as to what one is worth in the open market.

Can you see anyone paying marzie the guts of 600k for four hours live broadcast a week?

And give her ever school holiday, 10 weeks during the summer, off.

My proud and noble cock friend.:rolleyes:

Lenny Lovett

tbh wrote: »

That is a very valid point. I would wonder tho, if Marion went to newstalk, would/could they charge a similar rate? I'd suspect they could, or maybe about 90% of it. If they could, they could afford to pay MF a similar salary and it'd be a huge coup for them. Again, I'm not saying I'm happy with rte paying her so much, but from a business point of view, the figures add up IMO

You're assuming that "from a business point of view" it's fine that they sell enough advertising to cover her salary. But they they shouldn't be in business just to make enough money to pay outlandish sums to the so called talent. They should be striving to drive down what they pay individual presenters so that A. the more advertising revenue generated means there's less burden on the licence payer and B. There's more money to go around for more programme making thus employing more producers and presenters for the same money. Now that would make business sense.

Rubik. wrote: »

I don't doubt it would be a coup for Newstalk. But in the past few weeks we have seen presenters going in the opposite direction, mainly due to the differences in pay and conditions between RTE and Newstalk. It has to be remembered that Newstalk has yet to make a profit and would offer none of the security that RTE does.

Absolutely spot on. And there's no way Newstalk would be allowed by it's parent to squander that kind of money. The bottom line is that you could put the entire Radio 1 line up in Newstalk and it will not drag away much more listeners from Radio 1. Many people just listen to Radio 1 full stop. Do they all abandon Radio 1 when all the top names disappear for the summer? No. So why would they for the other nine months of the year?

donaghs

tbh wrote: »

Ok flutt hypothetical. Newstalk poach mars and stick her on mon-thurs, 9 to 10. Do you listen to by at that time now, and would you move if they stuck her on at that time? Or would you stick with your mate dublin John ?
Would you move if they stuck her on at the same time as PK? And if she legged it to nt and was in direct competition with, say, myles dungan, who Would you pick?

The presenter isn't always incidental. Mind you there are only three I'd follow no matter what - PK, Mars and matt cooper

Definitely hypothetical. How could Newstalk poach Marian? They're a business for God's sake. They have to make a profit, and do not go from door to door demanding money for a licence fee. Which is how RTE makes nearly half their money. What would Newstalk have to pay her to move? €600K, €700? for 4 hours? WTF!!!!

http://www.tribune.ie/news/article/2010/aug/29/newstalk-loses-yet-another-host-to-rte/

As long as we subsidize RTE through tax or the licence fee, they should be accountable - and have salaries comparable with the private sector.

tbh

donaghs wrote: »

Definitely hypothetical. How could Newstalk poach Marian? They're a business for God's sake. They have to make a profit, and do not go from door to door demanding money for a licence fee.

hang on - read my post again.

I would wonder tho, if Marion went to newstalk, would/could they charge a similar rate? I'd suspect they could, or maybe about 90% of it. If they could, they could afford to pay MF a similar salary and it'd be a huge coup for them.

Take the license fee out of it. RTE make a profit on Marions show without license fee, and without sponsorship monies.

As long as we subsidize RTE through tax or the licence fee, they should be accountable - and have salaries comparable with the private sector.

I'm not arguing with you, but if you're talking about subsidizing, then you're talking about an unprofitable show. The license fee is used to put on a show that would otherwise lose money. Marions show is making money for RTE in spades. You could argue, like lenny did, that that profit should be used to further subsidize public interest programming, or to drive down the license fee -both very valid arguments. But the license fee is not subsidising Marions show, which is the topic of discussion here.

Lenny Lovett

tbh wrote: »

But the license fee is not subsidising Marions show, which is the topic of discussion here.

How do you know? What are the production and transmission costs for her show? Bear in mind that during her three months summer break and her months Christmas break a replacement presenter has to be paid. A production team has to be paid all year round (six people on a five day week plus weekend allowances and time and a half for Sat and double time for Sunday). Cost of office space for said team. Costs of guests and their expenses. Remember most guests (except politicians) are charging an appearance fee. All this adds up. So, and having worked on many many radio productions and knowing the associated costs, I doubt the advertising revenue covers the entire cost.

Rubik.

tbh wrote: »

RTE make a profit on Marions show without license fee, and without sponsorship monies.

I'm not sure you can say this with any degree of certainty these days. 2fm went from a 3.5 million euro surplus to 1.76 million euro deficit in just one year. Up to last year 2fm was a net contributor, Radio 1 wasn't.

There is no doubt at this stage that RTE's top earners are facing significant cuts in salarly when their current contracts are up. Will any of them jump ship as a result? I suspect not.

Pat Kenny didn't when his salary was cut by a 1/3 in 2008. No rival network came riding to the rescue, paying him what he thought he was worth. Which clearly demonstrated that he was been overpaid all along and this notion that the RTE "stars" have to be paid vast sums of money to ward of the competition is a fallacy.

Lenny Lovett

Rubik. wrote: »

There is no doubt at this stage that RTE's top earners are facing significant cuts in salarly when their current contracts are up. Will any of them jump ship as a result? I suspect not.

I doubt the cuts will be too swingeing. Will they jump ship? Not a chance! Where would they go? Their salary may be cut a bit but the job security will always be there unlike with any of the others. Particularly Newstalk which has turned losses since it's inception and is unlikely to turn a profit anytime soon. RTE will continue to provide a generous fee for a host of Broadcasters whether they actually work or not. Did you know Gaybo has been on an annual €350k retainer from RTE TV(excluding his Lyric FM work!) since he retired from the LLS twelve years ago... Remind me how many TV series he's done since then please!

jdivision

tbh wrote: »

a 30 second ad during her show costs 720 euro - that's the 600 standard weekend slot, plus a 20% surcharge for the MF show. Lets say there's 10 minutes of advertising per hour, that works out at 10 * 60 = 600 / 30 = 20. 20 30 second ads at 720 per ad is 14,400 per hour, and 28,800 for two hours, or 2,246, 400 for her 156 hours a year.

2,246,400 - her salary of 570,000 = 1, 676, 400.


Her surcharge alone covers 374,400 of her salary, and that doesn't include the cost of sponsorship which is in addition to ad revenue.
Now, I'm not saying that RTE couldnt charge those rates if they didn't have Marser in the slot (although plenty seem to be happy to pay the 20% surcharge), but even allowing for the fact that possibly there wouldn't be ten mins of ads per hour, those figures would make you think.

no?

you're going off listed figures. In reality everybody charges less than 50% and often less than 40% of that.

DublinWriter

coletti wrote: »

Working it out, lets say she works 39 out of 52 weeks a year, thats 39 weeks @4 hours broadcasting per week, or a total of 156 hours a year, for which she is paid €570 000.

Thats an hourly rate of €3654.

You're assuming she clocks on at 11am and clocks off at 1pm.

In reality any front of camera/mic bod would be putting in the same amount of time again in meetings with research and production staff.

Even so, nice work if you can get it...

coletti

tbh wrote: »

The license fee is used to put on a show that would otherwise lose money. Marions show is making money for RTE in spades.

Thats speculation. Even if you are right, why does that justify paying a presenter almost €4000 per hour?

Maybe it's time to rethink the RTE licence fee. It is suggested that the licence fee is anti competitive, and that the EU competition commissioner should investigate why RTE should get 100% of the licence fee, while other broadcasters get not one red cent of it.

I think that would be a good idea, as I can't think of a single argument why one broadcaster should get 100% and the rest 0%.

coletti

Rubik. wrote: »

I'm not sure you can say this with any degree of certainty these days. 2fm went from a 3.5 million euro surplus to 1.76 million euro deficit in just one year. Up to last year 2fm was a net contributor, Radio 1 wasn't.

There is no doubt at this stage that RTE's top earners are facing significant cuts in salarly when their current contracts are up. Will any of them jump ship as a result? I suspect not.

Pat Kenny didn't when his salary was cut by a 1/3 in 2008. No rival network came riding to the rescue, paying him what he thought he was worth. Which clearly demonstrated that he was been overpaid all along and this notion that the RTE "stars" have to be paid vast sums of money to ward of the competition is a fallacy.

RTE's policy has been to vastly overpay their talent, to prevent them jumping ship. They can only do this because everyone with a tv set is force to pay RTE money every year. It's no longer justifiable and , hopefully, the EU will force the government to give the licence fee to all broadcasters, and end this bloated and not very good tv and radio station getting all the loot!

donaghs

DublinWriter wrote: »

You're assuming she clocks on at 11am and clocks off at 1pm.

In reality any front of camera/mic bod would be putting in the same amount of time again in meetings with research and production staff.

Even so, nice work if you can get it...

I don't think anyone's assuming that. Ryan Tubridy has to come in early every weekday to prepare for his show; and also for his TV work. If Marian was on air every day, or even for a longer slot, the disparity wouldn't look so mindblowingly crazy.

Nijmegen

RTE should set its presenters salaries by cutting their contracts, and offering Newstalk and even the likes of the BBC to bid for them. Then offer them a modest premium on those figures.

I can assure you that most of the talent, like our bankers, politicians and all the rest we've had to pay well, lest the mysterious international forces conspire to take them from us, would not be earning the same money.

coletti

Nijmegen wrote: »

RTE should set its presenters salaries by cutting their contracts, and offering Newstalk and even the likes of the BBC to bid for them. Then offer them a modest premium on those figures.

I can assure you that most of the talent, like our bankers, politicians and all the rest we've had to pay well, lest the mysterious international forces conspire to take them from us, would not be earning the same money.

Of course, should RTE decide to do that, they would leave themselves open to lawsuits citing breach of contract.

It would be interesting if they decided to only renew the contracts at 15% or so of the value, when each contract comes up for renewal.

I think RTE radio is by in large very poor. There is very little original content, and with few exceptions its all chat type shows with the same people saying the same things. The problems with RTE are problems of management, and that they fund their bloated lifestyle with our money which we are forced to hand over to them, on fear of imprisonment if we don't, is a disgrace which has gone on for far too long.

FlutterinBantam

coletti wrote: »

Of course, should RTE decide to do that, they would leave themselves open to lawsuits citing breach of contract.

It would be interesting if they decided to only renew the contracts at 15% or so of the value, when each contract comes up for renewal.

I think RTE radio is by in large very poor. There is very little original content, and with few exceptions its all chat type shows with the same people saying the same things. The problems with RTE are problems of management, and that they fund their bloated lifestyle with our money which we are forced to hand over to them, on fear of imprisonment if we don't, is a disgrace which has gone on for far too long.

Can't agree with that, fair is fair and while I say it has something in common with the HSE, good when you get tuned in, it has the same problem, It costs too much.

Content isn't the problem, just listen to other broadcasters, dire stuff, put quite simply ,it costs too much.

Lenny Lovett

coletti wrote: »

Of course, should RTE decide to do that, they would leave themselves open to lawsuits citing breach of contract.

Not only that, it's just a ridiculous suggestion.

coletti wrote: »

I think RTE radio is by in large very poor. There is very little original content, and with few exceptions its all chat type shows with the same people saying the same things.

I'm well known for being critical of RTE but your statement above is just not factually correct. Almost all of their radio output is original content. Yeah they have three hours of repeats on R1 overnight but that's hardly the end of the world.

coletti wrote: »

The problems with RTE are problems of management, and that they fund their bloated lifestyle with our money which we are forced to hand over to them, on fear of imprisonment if we don't, is a disgrace which has gone on for far too long.

Or perhaps Mis-management?

It's a shame this can't be discussed properly on the radio forum.

Elmo

Ian Dempsey's interview in Hot Press outlines the amount of work that Gay Byrne did for each programme before going on air, he also hit on Gerry Ryan's more relaxed work ethic. But I assume that Marian Finucane does much more than just Saturday and Sunday, kind of like saying a jorno in the News Papers only reads a Press Release and then rehashes it (not that they would ever do that). However her rate of pay is OTT for just Radio as she rarely does Television.

As for NewsTalk I am assuming that they paid Eamon Dunphy allot to move away from RTÉ in the last year or so and back at Today FM I wouldn't be surprised if Ian Dempsey wasn't getting a good wage slip from his bosses, remember he pretty much energized a failing Radio Ireland when it relaunched as Today FM. Communicorp have a pretty penny to spend on their "Stars".

However again I think the rates of pay in RTÉ (and in Communicorp) are OTT. As for TV3 if I was V. Browne I would be looking to move my show to Communicorp or I wouldn't be afraid to ask for a nicer pay packet. The rest of TV3's home produced programming just isn't getting the kind of viewers that RTÉ get. I would love to know how much George Hook is paid between RTÉ and Communicorp after all we are paying half his salary. :rolleyes:

copacetic

coletti wrote: »

Thats speculation. Even if you are right, why does that justify paying a presenter almost €4000 per hour?

Maybe it's time to rethink the RTE licence fee. It is suggested that the licence fee is anti competitive, and that the EU competition commissioner should investigate why RTE should get 100% of the licence fee, while other broadcasters get not one red cent of it.

I think that would be a good idea, as I can't think of a single argument why one broadcaster should get 100% and the rest 0%.

You don't need to, it isn't true.

Elmo

RTÉ Does not get 100% of the licence fee. 7% goes to the BAI for The Sound and Vision Fund which is distributed to independent producers for use on programming both on and off RTÉ, TV3 indirectly got 3million worth in 2008 via Independent production for TV3 (Radio Productions are also funded by the Sound and Vision Fund). RTÉ provide news and Current Affairs to TG4. RTÉ have to provide 20% of the licence fee to Indo Producers, they provide 40%. And RTÉ have 5 performing groups that they are required to have that no other broadcaster has to fund.