RTE to face cost cutting surgery

mike65

RTE is undertaking a major root and branch review of all of its overheads which will result in the most significant financial restructuring at the broadcaster in a decade says the Sunday Business Post in an article behind a pay wall.

I did hear it said that actual programmes will be cut from the schedule (stuff more substantial than Live at 4 or whatever it was called).

rOBeRt frETt

mike65 wrote: »

RTE is undertaking a major root and branch review of all of its overheads which will result in the most significant financial restructuring at the broadcaster in a decade says the Sunday Business Post in an article behind a pay wall.

I did hear it said that actual programmes will be cut from the schedule (stuff more substantial than Live at 4 or whatever it was called).

RTE have revenue coming from television and radio advertisement print media and their website gets revenue from google ads they have invested/ squandered whatever budget they had for programme development into reality tv ( the cheapest form of programming ) it trades like a private enterprise and collects massive sums from the Irish public. It pisses all this away on its self made 'super stars' and executives who's job it seems is to come up with more places it can put advertisements. If rte was not propped up with American and British quality programming it would utterly pointless navel gazing drivel. Thank god we have 2 channels so diametrically opposed too. Reform??? You can't polish a turd

watty

They will cut back on the wrong things.

ftakeith

watty wrote: »

They will cut back on the wrong things.

cut back on the bad tv programmes such as chat shows, celeb lifestyle programmes

icdg

watty wrote: »

They will cut back on the wrong things.

Almost certainly. There is a method to their madness though, cutting news and current affairs programming gets the attention of politicians (which dislike anything which means they will be seen on TV less) and can act as a motivation when RTÉ submits its next application for a licence fee increase and promises to increase news and current affairs programming...

ftakeith

icdg wrote: »

Almost certainly. There is a method to their madness though, cutting news and current affairs programming gets the attention of politicians (which dislike anything which means they will be seen on TV less) and can act as a motivation when RTÉ submits its next application for a licence fee increase and promises to increase news and current affairs programming...

put rtetv sunday political programmes between 12pm-2pm instead of 11pm
uktv political tv programmes are on at this time

Skid

I have never understood why RTE have five different Choirs and Orchestras (National Symphony Orchestra, RTE Concert Orchestra, Vanbrugh Quartet, RTE Philharmonic Choir and Cór na nóg)

They must cost a fortune to operate, and none of them contribute much to on-air output. Their main activities seem to be live concerts which are never broadcast, so why are they funded by the licence fee?

Any chance of someone doing a cost benefit analysis of these groups in the forthcoming review?

Elmo

Skid wrote: »

Any chance of someone doing a cost benefit analysis of these groups in the forthcoming review?

They take in 2.2 mil in 2010 and received 12.6mill from the licence fee. I assume they also broadcast a good bit on lyric fm.

In 2010 this was the funding for non-RTÉ TV and Radio content

Preforming Groups = 14.8m
Publishing = 17.2m
TG4 = 8.8m
Network = 27.2m
BAI Sound and Vision = 15.2m est
Collection Costs = 15.2m est

Total non RTÉ TV and Radio Content related money = 98.4m

Meaning about 25% never went near RTÉ TV and Radio Programming content.

This ignores Soarview and DAB costs.

The article suggested that RTÉ Radio might be removed from Satellite, another non-content related cost.

dublinman1990

Are those afternoon programmes; Four Live and The Daily Show going to come back on anytime soon? I haven't seen them on RTE for the last 3 weeks.

Are they going to be subjected to the cost-cutting review?

The Cush

dublinman1990 wrote: »

Are those afternoon programmes; Four Live and The Daily Show going to come back on anytime soon? I haven't seen them on RTE for the last 3 weeks.

Are they going to be subjected to the cost-cutting review?

Might be back in Sept.

This month RTÉ’s Four Live and The Daily Show have been taken off the air due to budget cuts while the station is undertaking a massive cost-cutting to ease its budget deficit.

Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/league-coverage-suffers-as-rte-cuts-hit-hard-186946.html#ixzz1pjoPYkhx

http://www.joe.ie/entertainment/television/live-at-3-returns-rte-set-to-give-daithis-daily-show-the-axe-0021823-1

watty

RTE Radio on Satellite is the only thing approaching an Irish External Service. It's not expensive either.

Of course the Government should separately fund External Broadcasting. But despite being one of the earliest Radio Broadcasters and a large Diaspora plus importance of tourism for 70 years we did nothing and now pay lip service to the idea of it over the last 20 years.

Idiots.

marno21

From what I can tell, RTE Radio on Astra 2 uses 864kbps of bandwidth (4 radio services on 10744H plus RTE Radio 1 Extra on Eurobird, hardly anything to write home about.

Last time I checked, they were using 544x576 on their satellite TV, so they could bring the bitrate down on their TV channels, it would save the radio and not make much of a difference to their video quality, considering it looks like rubbish to begin with.

mike65

Stars to see stars as pay cut by 30%

The cut of 25% ins sports rights sepnding will be interesting, I presume Champions League will suffer come the end of the current contract (TV3 with two nights would fill me with horror but for ITV - bad and all as that can be)

p.oconnor

mike65 wrote: »

(TV3 with two nights would fill me with horror but for ITV - bad and all as that can be)

Sport on TV3 ....(Shudder)

iseegirls

They should start sharing the Euros and World Cup with TV3, like BBC and ITV have done. This I'd say would save plenty of money.

Although TV3 ain't in great shape themselves - so I'm presuming that TV3 would have the money to go into such deals like two nights CL. If they would, I'd say they'd drop Europa League.

Elmo

iseegirls wrote: »

They should start sharing the Euros and World Cup with TV3, like BBC and ITV have done. This I'd say would save plenty of money.

They have a deal with the other European Broadcasters through the EBU for the Euros, World Cup and Olympics. AFAIK.

TV3 are in just as much trouble as RTÉ. The cost of rights for sports (and programming) will just reduce as they aren't worth as much as they used to be. RTÉ, TV3, TG4 and Setanta will pay 2012 prices, which will be far lower then 2008 prices.

Skid

A lot of media are reporting the story as if Tubridy, Duffy and the rest are facing further cuts, but I read it that they have already taken their medicine. These cuts are targeted at the next tier of earners, who had previously taken smaller reductions.

Having already cut the fees of its top 10 presenters by 30pc, the station confirmed that presenters in the rest of the top 20 have endured the same cut when having their contracts renewed over the past six months.

http://www.independent.ie/business/media/rte-staff-stunned-as-second-tier-stars-take-a-30pc-pay-cut-3066452.html

For Example, Joe Duffy said in October he was down 30% at that stage

RTÉ Liveline presenter Joe Duffy has revealed that he has taken a 30 per cent pay cut which came into force at the beginning of October.

Duffy was the fifth-highest paid presenter in RTÉ in 2008, the last year for which figures are available, earning €408,889.

A 30 per cent reduction would bring his fee back to €286,222.

Mr Duffy said he agreed to the cut two months ago as requested by RTÉ management and those cuts came into force on October 1st. “That’s what they asked for and that is what they get,” he told TV3’s Midweek programme.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/1021/1224306217737.html


I think the top 10 should take further cuts, particuarly Marian Finucane, whose salary is obscene for the hours she clocks up.

Elmo

There is no real argument for these prices even if we go through .... so and so gets paid X amount from RTÉ TV/TV3/TG4 and a radio service, even those wages are way too much.

To be kind I would reduce the top 5 down to 200000 each, next down to 150000 and anyone between 100000 to 150000 down to 100000.

Minstrel27

Elmo wrote: »

To be kind I would reduce the top 5 down to 200000 each, next down to 150000 and anyone between 100000 to 150000 down to 100000.

Absolutely and if they throw a hissy fit then leave them go and find someone willing to meet their demands