RTE Salaries 2020/2021

hamburgham

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120244862#Comment_120244862

Top 4 are laughable and I don’t even recognize all the other names in the ‘top 10’.

walterking

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120245039#Comment_120245039

Which mean RTE don't have to pay employee prsi and nor do they have to contribute to pensions.

What people hate to accept is that all of these presenters, whether you like them or not, are large NET earners for RTE. The Late Late Toy show alone more than pays for Tubridy's salary.

The commercial money they earn for rte then goes into children's programming, arts programming and mostly sports programming where GAA coverage is the most costly of all TV and is hugely subsidised by the programmes of the top earners and the licence fee

2smiggy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247107#Comment_120247107

net earners ??? hahahaha. They advertise each others shows in the advertising slots, or one of the two RTE concert orchestras. BTW they are paid as contractors into 1/2 person companies not for RTE's or the license fees payers benefit. It is to pay as little tax as possible. Any one with a basic understanding of our tax system could understand this.

It is nice how RTE accommodate all these 'contractors'. Any other contractors in normal walks of life have to price actual work, and lose it if too dear or incompetent (see the top 10 list for any combination of these)

leath_dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247107#Comment_120247107

I am skeptical about that, to be honest. If you listen to the advertisements, particularly during liveline, they are by and large promos for other RTE programs, TV licence ads, RTE Orchestra, "Toy Show, The Musical 😁" etc - very few commercial adverts. in fact one could argue that Duffy costs RTE advertising revenue by the amount of free promo opportunities he gifts to his friends, etc on the show

walterking

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247185#Comment_120247185

Due to RTE getting the bulk of licence fee, they have strict limits of advertising of average 10% of broadcast time with max of 9 minutes in any specific hour. (Virgin don't like when this is pointed out nor do the commercial radio station)

Commercial stations can have 18% of broadcast time as commercial advertising.

RTE will make up for it in more station promos as most TV programmes are made for a one hour broadcast time inclusive of 17-18min commercials. That's also why a lot of shows that go onto Netflix are 42-43 min long.

SuperBowserWorld

Job requirement: be false, fake, populist, bland, controllable, safe, boring, predictable, sell products.

pjordan

"Which mean RTE don't have to pay employee prsi and nor do they have to contribute to pensions.

What people hate to accept is that all of these presenters, whether you like them or not, are large NET earners for RTE. The Late Late Toy show alone more than pays for Tubridy's salary.

The commercial money they earn for rte then goes into children's programming, arts programming and mostly sports programming where GAA coverage is the most costly of all TV and is hugely subsidised by the programmes of the top earners and the licence fee"

If one adopts that logic then one would expect Carville, Jennings and English of Morning Ireland (by far and away the highest listenership on Irish radio and presumably advertising revenue draw) along with Curran of The Business and Ronan Collins to be well up the high earners list, unless of course they are direct employees of RTE with different "arrangements". Equally one supposes the TV news presenters apart from George Lee are also all in the very high earnings bracket just below the top 10

However, I would beg to differ that it is the star presenters that draw listenership. The slot has much more of a draw than the presenter as can be evidenced by the departure of the likes of O Rourke and Finucane. Whilst it might not warrant putting on a bog standard presenter sourced from local radio as mentioned above (Although there are many in that sector perfectly capable and competent to take on such roles) I believe putting any of the range of available RTE personaties into a particualr slot will retain most of the listenership.

Your argument above along with a few others defending the payments sound like they come straight from the NKM PR department (who of course also handsomely benefit from a sizeable cut of all these payments!).

RoTelly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120244999#Comment_120244999

Joe is not taking more breaks, RTÉ Radio can only air a max of 9min of ads per hour and an average of 6min across the day.

No I agree they are not but they are not value for money.

Radio5

The pay for George Lee in 2021 is extraordinary considering how little he does for it, even compared to the others.

leath_dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247473#Comment_120247473

I'm sure he was talking about holidays, time off, etc - not advert breaks

leath_dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247216#Comment_120247216

The point was made that the likes of Joe Duffy is a net earner for RTE. Where is the revenue coming from? There are sod -all commercial adverts during his show and I don't believe he has a main sponsor any more

NIMAN

Did some of the top 'stars' shows not struggle to get a main advertiser in in recent times?

Wasn't Tubs even without a sponsor for a while before Center Parcs came on board? Now if he is meant to be such an attraction for advertisers why did that happen?

And Ballsy O'Connors show, him on 245k per year, also had no sponsor for quite a while iirc.

RoTelly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247556#Comment_120247556

They could be right about that. Tubs and CB get about 40 to 50 days holiday a year from Radio, I counted the last 2 years, I am sad like that. That like 8 - 10 weeks, they do very well on the Holiday front.

Re: George Lee, You also have to remember that other correspondents would be on similar wages and might just be outside to to 10. On top of that outside of Crime and Locals they seem to be on holidays when anything is happening.

Remember we have found out that Fair City's Tony Tormey is getting between 99,000 to 120,000 a year.

2smiggy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248025#Comment_120248025

Tony Tormey wants a permanent number now, after 18 years of working as another 'contractor' for RTE. Maybe he can see the writing on the wall for his character.

Joe Duffy is a temporary contractor, that could be let go at any moment, on liveline for the last 24 years

ButtersSuki

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120246656#Comment_120246656

That was me.

TMFMS.

RoTelly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248127#Comment_120248127

I would have though he's a contractor since he started in FC back in 1989. They don't know the market in RTÉ. From what I can gather Hollyoaks actors are getting circa £40,000 for a full time character, while FC is paying out circa €90,000!

2smiggy

RTE is a gravy train of epic proportions. I know it's easy to look on in disgust at the whole thing, but for those already on it it's hard to turn down the obscene sums of money.

People even mentioned camera and sound people working for RTE. Other stations what man be a 1-2 person job, with RTE it's a full crew of workers, all on top money. It's like the county council on crack

Expunge

I just did an attendance tot up for both Tubridy and Duffy for 2020 and 2021, using the the list of 'listen back' shows for each of them on the RTE Radio 1 website. It show the days they were on air and the days they were replaced by others. I think it's pretty accurate but might be out by a show or two.

I found that in 2020 Tubridy presented 211 out of 254 radio shows - "fees" that year 466,250

Joe Duffy presented 205 out of 253 Livelines - "fees": 360,650

In 2021, Tubridy again presented 211 out of 253 radio shows - paid 440,000

Joe Duffy presented 214 out of 247 Livelines - paid 351,000

Of course, they may have been 'working' on their dreadful TV shows on some of these missed show days.

Again, this might be a bit rough as a calculation, but this idea they're doing fewer radio shows doesn't seem to hold water. Someone at an Executive level has finally grown a pair of balls, it seems and has told Noel Kelly to lower his clients' expectations. It seems that some on that Top Ten know in their heart of hearts that they are close to stealin' a living and accepted their cuts.

Those two are still massively overpaid in my opinion and, sadly, any savings have probably been spaffed up against the wall after the Toy Show the Musical debacle.

ButtersSuki

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120245287#Comment_120245287

Except the UK has a population of 67.5million........you really are not comparing like with like. The TV Show is also shown on BBC America (and in other markets -I saw it on the listings when I was in Hong Kong). It even commands a sizeable audience when Virgin show it here as a repeat!

And Norton also as a BBC radio show.

Damien360

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248200#Comment_120248200

Pat Kenny said this some time ago on his Newstalk program. Specifically the late late camera crews had it sown up because of union involvement. People holding the wires were paid same as a camera operator. A job that TV3 would have down to 2 people would be a 4 person job in RTE. In TV3 there would be a senior earner and a junior skivvy of sorts. The rte equivalent would all be on the same top salary. He long ago said ignore the salaries of the top people and start looking at the multitudes of middle people, that is where the waste is.

Scotty #

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120247157#Comment_120247157

According to RTE's Rate Card, Liveline charge avg €1,700 per 30 second slot (price varies on time of year). Ads shorter than 30 seconds are charged more per second (probably most ads?).

Based in 9min of ads per hour that's a minimum of €30,600 per hour of Liveline. 5 shows per week, 52 weeks per year = c. €8,000,000 per year in ad revenue (based on one hour show). This does NOT include promotions, competitions, show sponsors, which I would guess adds at least another €500k a year. It also doesn't include further ad revenue from podcasts, online, etc.

I've no idea of the costs of running the show but I'd say even after Duffy is paid there's a sizable profit.

leath_dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248410#Comment_120248410

Have you listened to the ad breaks at all? What you are describing is the potential revenue. given the available slots. The point, which you seem to be missing, is that a vast majority of the used slots are freebies - promos, etc

2smiggy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248410#Comment_120248410

are RTE invoicing themselves for the ads ? many of the liveline ads are for other RTE shows !! running the electric off the gas and the gas off the electric , so to speak.

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248520#Comment_120248520

A number of people were claiming that the reduction in salaries was due to Tubridy and others taking more holidays. That has been disproved in a post on this page. It was simply that their memory was faulty, unless they had an agenda to make up malacious lies. Your recollection of the advertisement content on more than 200 programmes every year could be equally faulty. It needs actual figures to prove it one way or another. Fair play for listening every day, but those others are also dedicated listeners to RTE radio.

The amount of government advertising on all radio is mental, It's crazy that there are still ads running shilling covid and flu vaccines.

2smiggy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248641#Comment_120248641

for those who don't get all their news off youtube, they may not agree with the description of 'shilling' of vaccines.

Aurelian

I'd be very surprised if they are getting anything like those rates as their competitor stations certainly are not.

dxhound2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248641#Comment_120248641

It makes sense to use the programmes with the highest listening figures to send out public service messages.

Scotty #

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248520#Comment_120248520

lol, listen to Joe Duffy? lol....

ButtersSuki

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120248410#Comment_120248410

Here we go again.

No-one - and I mean no-one - pays rate card. Advertising is bought in bulk by media agencies at huge discounts off rate card. And ads are not charged per second if they're shorter.

Liveline not only doesn't have 9 minutes of ads per show, often it has NO paying ads - promos for other RTE shows are not paid ads.

There's also no promotions or competitions on Liveline - it's not a "Text in to win a Coffin" type show.

Ad revenue from podcasts?!!!!!! Lol. The last time RTE released the podcast numbers their most downloaded show had less than 500 podcast downloads IN A FULL YEAR!!!!!!!!!

Online advertising? What online advertising revenue does Liveline generate?

I'm sorry but you really haven't a clue what you are talking about.

AND RE. RUNNING COSTS - at one stage Liveline had a team of 7 separate producers (not researchers!), plus researchers. If they're "only" (by RTE standards) making €100,000 a year each the running costs of this show are enormous.