RTE's top ten earners paid €3.6 million in 2011

Iwannahurl

RTÉ has released figures for its top ten earners: Tubs, Pat, Marian, Miriam, Joe et al.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2013/0327/378701-rte-releases-highest-earners-list/

The total remuneration amounts to nearly €3.6 million, if I've done my sums right.

One way of looking at that figure is to consider that over 22,000 people had to pay their TV licence in 2011 to compensate RTE's top ten presenters.

That's the equivalent of every man, woman and child in Athlone paying €160 each to keep Joe & Co. in the style to which they had become accustomed, up to 2011 at any rate.

Meanwhile, in the same year 194 people were sent to prison for non-payment of TV licence fines, compared to 31 in 2006 at the height of the boom.

Perhaps Joe, champion of the woahking class and trouserer of €378,000, might care to dedicate a programme to whatever part of this story he thinks is a scandalous injustice.

orestes

Didn't the same news report on RTE salaries on the 6 o' clock news tonight say that they had all taken a pay cut of at least 30% each this year?

Or are you just giving out about something from two years ago that has already been changed just for the hell of it?

Hootanany

Here here.

Fromthetrees

Iwannahurl wrote: »

RTÉ has released figures for its top ten earners: Tubs, Pat, Marian, Miriam, Joe et al.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2013/0327/378701-rte-releases-highest-earners-list/

The total remuneration amounts to nearly €3.6 million, if I've done my sums right.

One way of looking at that figure is to consider that over 22,000 people had to pay their TV licence in 2011 to compensate RTE's top ten presenters.

That's the equivalent of every man, woman and child in Athlone paying €160 each to keep Joe & Co. in the style to which they had become accustomed, up to 2011 at any rate.

Meanwhile, in the same year 194 people were sent to prison for non-payment of TV licence fines, compared to 31 in 2006 at the height of the boom.

Perhaps Joe, champion of the woahking class and trouserer of €378,000, might care to dedicate a programme to whatever part of this story he thinks is a scandalous injustice.

It's absolute insanity that people go to jail because they can't/won't pay the massive tv license fee.

We pay enough as it is.

squod

I want topless TV presenters for that kind of money.

GLaDOS

The fact that after a 30% pay cut Tubridy earns nearly half a million a year makes me feel genuinely ill.

oppenheimer1

Iwannahurl wrote: »

RTÉ has released figures for its top ten earners: Tubs, Pat, Marian, Miriam, Joe et al.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2013/0327/378701-rte-releases-highest-earners-list/

The total remuneration amounts to nearly €3.6 million, if I've done my sums right.

One way of looking at that figure is to consider that over 22,000 people had to pay their TV licence in 2011 to compensate RTE's top ten presenters.

That's the equivalent of every man, woman and child in Athlone paying €160 each to keep Joe & Co. in the style to which they had become accustomed, up to 2011 at any rate.

Meanwhile, in the same year 194 people were sent to prison for non-payment of TV licence fines, compared to 31 in 2006 at the height of the boom.

Perhaps Joe, champion of the woahking class and trouserer of €378,000, might care to dedicate a programme to whatever part of this story he thinks is a scandalous injustice.

For the last three, Mooney, Dobson and O'Rourke, I wonder does that include the amount paid for employers PRSI as well.

donvito99

Just wait til the Broadcast fee or whatever comes in. You won't need a TV to be charged an extortionate fee for shoddy television programming, not to mention endless ads and The Voice.

Hootanany

Who watches RTE

Iwannahurl

orestes wrote: »

Didn't the same news report on RTE salaries on the 6 o' clock news tonight say that they had all taken a pay cut of at least 30% each this year?

Or are you just giving out about something from two years ago that has already been changed just for the hell of it?

Eamon Dunphy is down over 60% iirc.

News is news.

Iwannahurl

squod wrote: »

I want topless TV presenters for that kind of money.

You want the shirt off their back as well?

tony007

It's a disgrace Joe.

orestes

Iwannahurl wrote: »

Eamon Dunphy is down over 60% iirc.

News is news.

You said in the opening post that RTE has released the wages of their top ten earners for 2011 and used a bunch of comparisons to call the rates of pay unfair. You didn't mention at all that the actual news announcement by RTE was that they were cutting their top ten earners' wages by 30% of their 2011 salary.

That's a misrepresentation of facts to support an agenda, which is not news, unless you're writing for the Daily Mail.

Red Kev

The fact that their wages are being cut by 30% is old news, it was released some weeks ago.

Their wages for 2011 is new news. RTE do not tell the taxpayer how much they pay the top dogs in RTE until a couple of years later. This has being going on for some time.

EuropeanSon

What would people propose they get paid instead?

DrumSteve

EuropeanSon wrote: »

What would people propose they get paid instead?

The market rate? They sure as ****e wouldnt be on that money over the water.

awec

DrumSteve wrote: »

The market rate? They sure as ****e wouldnt be on that money over the water.

Which is what?

The Scientician

EuropeanSon wrote: »

What would people propose they get paid instead?

Considering Tubofshíte will get paid 2.5 times what the Taoiseach gets even when his salary is slashed that seems a slight indicator that he's beening overpaid even still. I'd be happy with an RTÉ salary cap of €100k or thereabouts. It's plenty of money, none of the "top talent" would starve.

dzer2

The Scientician wrote: »

Considering Tubofshíte will get paid 2.5 times what the Taoiseach gets even when his salary is slashed that seems a slight indicator that he's beening overpaid even still. I'd be happy with an RTÉ salary cap of €100k or thereabouts. It's plenty of money, none of the "top talent" would starve.

Or leave:rolleyes:

EuropeanSon

The Scientician wrote: »

Considering Tubofshíte will get paid 2.5 times what the Taoiseach gets even when his salary is slashed that seems a slight indicator that he's beening overpaid even still. I'd be happy with an RTÉ salary cap of €100k or thereabouts. It's plenty of money, none of the "top talent" would starve.

Why would the Taoiseach's pay matter? They are in different industries. Tubridy presents a show that gets about a million viewers a week, plus a presumably popular radio show. I wouldn't imagine (admittedly without a great knowledge of the industry) what he gets is far off the market rate.

People seem to always react this way to the news that somebody in a big job gets paid a lot of money. It's just begrudgery, as far as I can see, and people looking for an excuse to moan about something.

*For the record, I don't watch or listen to any of his shows

The Scientician

dzer2 wrote: »

Or leave:rolleyes:

Sure if they left that'd be an added bonus. RTÉ needs new talent.

Chuck Stone

Hootanany wrote: »

Who watches RTE

Lots of people.

EuropeanSon wrote: »

What would people propose they get paid instead?

There should be some sort of cap on wages paid from the public purse. No more than 5/6 x times the average industrial wage or something like that.

EuropeanSon

Chuck Stone wrote: »

There should be some sort of cap on wages paid from the public purse. No more than 5/6 x times the average industrial wage or something like that.

Why?

fran17

talk to joe me arse.hypocrisy of the highest order

gurramok

EuropeanSon wrote: »

Why?

We pay their wages for majorly crap programming and some people who cannot afford their wages are sent to prison.

The Scientician

EuropeanSon wrote: »

Why would the Taoiseach's pay matter? They are in different industries. Tubridy presents a show that gets about a million viewers a week, plus a presumably popular radio show. I wouldn't imagine (admittedly without a great knowledge of the industry) what he gets is far off the market rate.

People seem to always react this way to the news that somebody in a big job gets paid a lot of money. It's just begrudgery, as far as I can see, and people looking for an excuse to moan about something.

*For the record, I don't watch or listen to any of his shows

If there were no licence fee his salary would be none of my business and I wouldn't complain but since he's got a contract with RTÉ that us suckers have to pay for and put up with advertising and a dire overall level of quality from I have every right to question his huge salary. Although different industries I would think most people might imagine running a country would be more difficult and perhaps garner a better salary than presenting a show once a week.

What's the market rate? You'd have to look at television somewhere similar to Ireland like maybe Scotland, see what its top tier broadcasters are paid. I haven't been able to find that information and I'm not sure that Scotland even has local broadcasters in quite the same way Ireland has. If any of them are on €500,000 a year I'd be supremely surprised. However even if some of them are on €500,000 or more a year that doesn't tell us a whole lot as Scotland is still a part of the UK and the BBC licence fee etc. may well distort the "market".

Perhaps some other small population countries might be a better match, maybe New Zealand.

Send Tubridy over to TV3 for a few months and see what his ratings are like there and then come back to me. I've a feeling The Late Late would get a certain decent chunk of the ratings even if they had a rhesus monkey presenting, considering its slot and its decades long reputation.

MadsL

Graham Norton gets 2 million a year for a show with 4.5million viewers. Tubs should be on about 500k sterling by that measure. He gets €373,000 now.

BBC do sell the GN show internationally though, and the Late Late brings in f all abroad.

In fact RTE are crap at international sales, they block the RTEplayer for UK and other IP addresses, but don't have a pay per view or subscription model. (Duh!)

Chuck Stone

EuropeanSon wrote: »

Why?

Why not?

Who the hell does RTE compete against to inflate the salaries of these guys?

velo.2010

I'm trying to get this straight in my head. Last time there was a report on salaries like this, Tubridy had a year or more as Late Late presenter and the recession had been ongoing for some time at that stage. The public had already started clammering for top RTE earners to have their salaries cut. My memory of that report was that Tubridy earned somewhere between e400,000-500.000.

If thats right and with no up to date earnings released (only 2 year old contracts were made public), RTE bumped Tubridy's salary to e750.000 then asked him to take a 'paycut'! Seems like RTE and Tubridy knew the public anger when his next salary increase would be made public and engineered this 30% decrease to save-face and let Tubridy keep his already inflated half million euro salary.

Sly Feckers!

Sierra 117

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Why not?

Who the hell does RTE compete against to inflate the salaries of these guys?

That's something I've always wondered. RTE could pay it's top presenters far less and it would still be more than TV3 or TG4 could offer them so why are they being paid such huge wages?

I mean, it's understandable in the UK where BBC, ITV and Channel 4 can match each other in the wages stake. But it makes no sense in Ireland.

MadsL

Sierra 117 wrote: »

That's something I've always wondered. RTE could pay it's top presenters far less and it would still be more than TV3 or TG4 could offer them so why are they being paid such huge wages?

I mean, it's understandable in the UK where BBC, ITV and Channel 4 can match each other in the wages stake. But it makes no sense in Ireland.

Post-Terry Wogan stress disorder?