The future of RTE after Tubsgate.

If the front of todays Irish Mail on Sunday is to be believed, the government is planning to take the axe to RTE. I’d definitely agree with selling off 2FM. Playing pop music is not a public service obligation.

After all thats come to light in the last 10 days or so it’s clear that fundamental reform of RTE is needed. Merely changing the way the top brass operates or bringing in a broadcasting charge as solutions just won’t cut it anymore IMO.

RTE’s dual funding model needs looking at as its created this opaque hybrid entity we have now. Personally i would strip it of it’s commercial income and redistribute that to the independents. If that meant a dramatically slimmed down RTE living off a license fee/broadcasting charge only then so be it. If that’s not gonna happen then a more clear separation of RTE’s PSB obligations and it’s commercial activities should occur.

icdg

I note there are several other threads on this elsewhere. However there’s none here, and this being the Broadcasting forum, it would be very odd if we couldn’t discuss a major broadcasting issue just because there was a thread on it elesewhere.

the_amazing_raisin

I'm actually in favour of the dual funding model for public broadcasters. If you take the BBC as an example of a public broadcaster fully funded by license fees, it's been quite vulnerable to political interference over the years.

They would often push climate deniers and other conspiracy theories because they were required to present a "balanced" argument. And when they start asking too many difficult questions of the government, some party crony gets put in charge to quickly crush any investigative journalism

So I'm fine with the likes of a public broadcaster having a second income source to give them independence from political interference

However, it's quite clear that the public is not getting good value for their licence fees and reform is needed of how the money is distributed and the level of oversight involved

In terms of the broadcasting infrastructure, I think it's pretty obvious that it should be funded, however there's a good debate over exactly what is worth funding.

For example the government could turn around and say that most content is delivered online now and they're already funding high speed internet rollout so there's no need to fund TV and radio infrastructure

I don't think that'd realistically happen, however it does remain a possibility

I would like to see more distribution of the licence fees towards the content side. Independent journalism is one obvious beneficiary of the licence fees. I realise that it's hard to consider any journalism fully independent when it receives government money, however we can see from examples like Fox News that fully commercial journalism is at least as bad, if not worse.

I think funding should be directed to multiple news outlets through different forms of media (TV, radio, print and online) and legislation should be introduced requiring that a broad range of viewpoints be supported, so one party couldn't simply remove funding from opposition news platforms

I would also like to see more funding directed towards Irish media companies. A lot of that has just been money thrown at RTE to develop media, and frankly I would say they have yet to produce a single good original show in nearly a century of operations

We've seen that there are plenty of Irish studios who can produce much more interesting content and they deserve to be supported. Frankly I've always felt TG4 to produce far superior original shows on a fraction of the budget (despite the fact that I can barely understand the Irish language)

Even if we aren't producing original shows, there's plenty of supporting industries around filmmaking in Ireland which would probably benefit from some extra money and be more competitive to international companies

On the flip side, I think it's fair to say the whole industry has a pretty rotten core to it. I've spoken with several people who have worked in and around the industry and the view is pretty common that the whole thing runs on a combination of alcohol, drugs, abusive workplaces, dodgy finances and backhanders

No one company is named, but if a bunch of unrelated people claim to have witnessed similar things then there's likely some truth there

This might be something that commercial investors are willing to accept, but as license payers we should expect more IMO. So any company receiving public funds should have to sign up to greater oversight of their spending and workplace to ensure everything is above board. I think it'll be telling if some media companies refuse to agree to those terms 😏

Anyway, those are my long winded and meandering thoughts on the topic, and are probably way off the purpose of the broadcasting forum 😂

Testcard

RTÉ as it stands is not at all fit for purpose. I fully agree with the selling off of RTÉ2 TV and 2FM. I would liquidate RTÉ and absorb RTÉ One, Radio 1, RnaG and Lyric FM into the TG4 organisation who would then become the national broadcaster.

RTÉ One (maybe rebrand it Telefís Éireann!) should only show Irish made programming but I would not kill off entertainment programming on the channel.

Commercial sponsorship needs to come to an end. By all means sell spot advertising as they do now.

The RTÉ player is a broken joke; scrap it and add its content to the TG4 player and offer a subscription to overseas viewers to watch the content. RTÉ deliberately ignore overseas viewers using grey market Sky subs and subscriptions to illegal IPTV services. That’s a loss of significant revenue.

z80CPU

Over Reliance on Sports programming . Especially for Radio 1.

Just look at the Weekend fare on offer.

I suppose I can still listen to Lyric FM though.

icdg

I’ve seen a few posts advocating merging with TG4, I’d maybe consider what that would do to TG4, and it’s particular mission of promoting the Irish language, to suddenly swamp it with an English language broadcasting remit.

My own view is that RTE will survive, but ironically a more commercial RTE, one with, with the absence of public funding reform, is forced to rely more heavily on advertising and sponsorship.

The Mail article in the OP has been officially denied, i understand.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120797222#Comment_120797222

From what I've read the only bit that was denied was the 400 redundancies and the plan to sell off segments

Breaking up RTE and redirecting the license fees are possibly still on the table

Also it's worth remembering how fond the government is of testing public opinion by "leaking" various plans and ideas. One common theme seems to be to leak the most radical form of a plan (total breakup of RTE) to a news outlet which is somewhat removed from the government's political direction (i.e. anything other than The Irish Times) and then see how the public reacts

If the response is good then they say that's the plan. If there's a negative reaction they either deny the whole things or walk back the more controversial parts of it and say that was never the plan in the first place

Articles like that would also sharpen the minds of and RTE senior managers who are being called into hearing with the PAC. They might be a bit more helpful if they know their jobs are on the line

NorthDown2

As a Nordie, I enjoy a lot of content on RTE.

2FM- yes it was a cash cow for RTE in decades gone by, but not now. It has little unique - could it be reformed like Matthew Bannister's BBC Radio 1 (he introduced comedy, focus on new music etc) - give it a USP. Is replacing with RTE Gold a possibility? At least it would then be more different to the alternatives on offer. It would allow for spillover sport (where R1 has already sport on) somewhere to broadcast - I don't see RnaG and Lyric being easy bed fellows for any extra sport to broadcast. Had DAB still been on air, I'd have said spillover sport could have gone there, but that's dead and there's no LW or MW either!

Lyric FM - enjoy listening to this - it's not too high brow, the sound of it is not over processed like Classic FM / Scala. The squeeze of finances was seen in it - witness the specialist shows getting the axe about 5 years ago. It's now just presenter led shows.

Radio1 - In years gone by, I felt that this had a good mix of trying to be a bit of BBC Radio 2 and Radio 4. I feel it errs more towards BBC Radio 5 phone in type material to fill air space in recent years. A lot of the Radio 4 type material - drama, feedback, book reading, Thomas Davis lectures have either gone or is minimal. I don't mind sport being here, or that RTE has a good number of rights for audio commentary (esp for Rugby :-) - make sure Against the Head on tv remains! )

RnaG - keep. I know it has competition from Raidio RiRa who are seeking a national license but it seems to serve its purpose with a varied mix of programming being developed and produced well away from Montrose. I only have a cupla focal.

Television - I get the RTE2 criticism out there. Again, where does spillover sport go if sport does move to RTE One? With digital, at least there's RTE One +1 - would the government allow it to be used to broadcast live spillover sport when needed, or let it remain on RTE News when needed (in which case what happens when there's a major news event and sport at the same time). RTE2 in years gone by brought american drama months before UK broadcast, so lucrative for advertising and keeping RTE afloat, but outside of sport, Home Rescue, Against the Head I struggle to say I watch anything on it. Children's programmes have a home on RTE Jr, it would be good to see the odd live programme appear for children, if RTE2 is sold off, I'd ask that wherever sport and children's shows go - those channels' resolution on Saorview be improved to near HD. RTE 2 used to have night time news - I'd like to see this back, or at least the broom cupboard news bulletin on RTE One that used to follow the Late Late.

RTE One - some good programmes. I like the documentaries that are often post nine news on a Monday, enjoying the RIAM three parter at the moment that's on after 10 another night. Nationwide good, enjoy some of the half hour programmes - Animal SOS, Scannal, SuperGarden, Keys to My Life, How Long Will You Live etc. Whilst it is maybe starting to get tired, Ireland Fittest Family was that rare thing of an entertainment format created in Ireland that worked.

I can't see the government giving RTE much more money from the license fee - maybe an extra one off to get structural reform in place in the organisation. I am sorry for the workers left there in this mess trying to produce programming whilst the executive sit at the committees and paper chase. There is a need for a national broadcaster - I hope people still support it financially.

Furze99

RTE employ orchestras which are pretty redundant in modern Ireland and a niche interest. Tough on the musicians but they need to go elsewhere for work or find a new patron/ sponsor.

icdg

They have handed some of that remit over to the National Concert Hall already, just the RTE Concert Orchestra left. And your “pretty redundant” is another person’s art, otherwise the NCH would have itself closed down, as would Lyric FM which plays mainly orchestral music.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120798874#Comment_120798874

With regards to spillover sport, RTE will have to use it’s Player similar to the BBCs iPlayer. Wimbledon started today and there’s only one extra BBC red button channel for it on Freeview and satellite. All the rest of it’s coverage is via multiple streams on the iPlayer.

Should RTE want to show more coverage of, say, the GAA’s expanded football championship where sometimes you have games at the same time, it will have to use the Player to do this IMO.

icdg

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120800857#Comment_120800857

That worked out very well for the BBC yesterday, didn’t it?!?!? And iPlayer has a much better rep than RTE Player, which means expectations are probably a lot higher, of course, and a failure like the one yesterday (even though it happened in the middle of the day on a weekday) attracts more attention.

The RTE Player just really needs some love. It doesn’t work as well as it should and some of the issues sometimes appear to be deliberate (like, why is there never issues with the hated pre-roll adverts?).

I’m not saying it’s not the way things should be going. TG4’s Player has none of these issues and works much better. But the RTE Player is clearly not capable of doing what is already asked of it, and thats an issue for those who are arguing that we should be asking more of it.

lawrencesummers

The problems at RTE are due to financial issues.

The organization and its content is something that everyone has an opinion on and nobody is completely happy about.

If you like sport they dont show enough of it, if you dont like sport they show too much of it.

The same goes for most other genres of program, music, history, current affairs.

Its easy find a stick to beat RTE with when they are trying to be all things to all people and thats just not possible, its time to give up on that pipe dream and bring it back to basics.

One choice that I would not be opposed to is to significantly reduce the license fee (by 50% at least) and keep one dedicated News / Weather / current affairs / prime time investigation TV channel and one Radio channel alongside TG4 and one Irish radio channel all under one organization. Significantly improve the online digital offering and sell the rights for the late late show to virgin. Lyric FM and 2fm can become online only. It would not have any commercial income and would not need to sell advertising revenue or care about viewership figures.

That would leave it up to the individual to source their own Sport like a GAA now subscription, skysports for soccer, or the URC have their own online platform also.

Its high time RTE went back to basics

lertsnim

Sell the rights to the late late show? Why would Virgin Media buy that when all they'd have to do is put on any kind of talk show on a Friday evening. They'd have no competition on the Irish airwaves as RTÉ will surely have closed down for the day by 9pm with your cuts.

lawrencesummers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120802262#Comment_120802262

Yea they can put one on, they cant use the same name however and they wont automatically get the viewers, if its promoted as moving from RTE to Virgin with the same name then people might be more inclined to buy into it.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120802193#Comment_120802193

I’d agree the RTE player needs to be built into a robust product before it can be used more widely. I think the future will move to be inevitably online though. The niece and the other half moved into their new house at Xmas. They bought a big tv but never thought about getting an aerial and/or dish installed. They watch everything online.

sheehan6023

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120802225#Comment_120802225

There's a lot to be said in favour of this.

You'd start off by making cuts to RTE TV. There's no need for RTE2, there's no evidence that people watch more than one channel at a time so RTE1 is enough. RTE1 HD costs too much to run, so axe that and just keep RTE1 +1, cheaper to broadcast. Get rid of RTE News Now and replace it with RTE News On Demand, which will show classic stories from Aertel.

On the radio side, same story, get rid of 2FM. The music they play is too niche and there isn't the evidence for the demand. Lyric FM would be replaced by RTE Country & Western, and sold to Virgin Media 4.

To save on transmission costs, the broadcast network would be shut down except for LW 252 where no expense will be spared and the mast will be plated in gold. It'll broadcast RTE Radio 1 during the day and at night the air time will be sold off to advertisers seeking to reach people in old cars.

Sam Russell

Now three barter accounts.

The problem is not so much these are off balance sheet and outside financial control, but they are hidden for oversight.

Is there any check on value of the two sides of the exchange?

If an advert slot is bartered for a ham sandwich - is that good value? Is the value of an advert slot that expires in fifteen minutes of any value? Is the ham sandwich of any value once it is eaten? Who gets to eat the ham sandwich?

The amount of barter at RTE appears to be 0.1% of turnover - not accounted for at all. Is that serious - or is it at the level of paperclips or the cost of disposable coffee cups or water for the water coolers?

We need to know more - well - we might like to know more, but would it cost more than its worth to know more? Remember, we are paying the bill for Grant Thornton.

Arthur Pants

On the face of it, a fee of just over EUR 80k for a EUR 150K transaction doesn't seem to be good value.

I think the question is why was the barter account used for any specific transaction - was it required, did it make sense e.g. financially, or in the case of the Tubridy payment, was it purely used to obfuscate.

spuddy

The issue is the funding model for RTE. Their commercial arm ruled the roost, resulting in the lavish pay deals, the barter accounts, the subterfuge, and with scant regard for the licence payer along the way. This is the core of the problem, it's time to choose one model going forward.

Emblematic

I've suggested this in a different thread already but I think the fundamental split should be:

1. Irish content funding (public).
2. Streaming and broadcasting platforms (privately owned and funded).

The basic idea of this split is to keep the public side very small and focussed so that the current problems don't build up again over time.

The Irish content funding body would be a bit like an arts council. I would not produce anything itself but would accept submissions and provide subsidy for independent producers making their productions competitive with imported programmes. This subsidised content would be sold on the open market.

Every thing else becomes a commercial entities subject to market discipline competing with Virgin Media and the like. Content subsidised by the funding body would be purchased by this entity along with imported content.

icdg

Sounds very like the situation in New Zealand - where TVNZ is, although state owned, essentially a fully commercial broadcaster, and must bid for public funding from the local equivalent of the Sound and Vision Scheme on the same basis as anyone else.

Although it’s not an outcome I favour, I could fully see how we could arrive there in the current climate. The more the controversy rolls on and on the more I fear there won’t be an RTE in the form we know it by the end of it.

Sam Russell

Well, RTE should remember they are a broadcaster that aims to 'Inform, Educate, and Entertain' their licence payers.

To do that they need to concentrate in making programmes that actually do that. If they have achieved those objects, and the viewers approve by watching the output, then the funding follows.

To have to wine and dine the agents at RTE's expense, look for sponsors for unrelated programmes, show the organisation is open to discounts - all of these things debases the organisation.

Now, the Gov could guarantee a certain level of Gov information advertising, and look to commission a number of tutorial type of public information programmes - and for that guarantee a level of funding to provide that.

At the moment RTE News is a channel paid for by RTE but has no income because it is not allowed to carry adverts. How can it provide proper news content with no money? Children's programming suffers the same thing - lack of funds.

RTE commissions programmes from independent production companies. Now what oversight is there for value for money there?

RTE has served us well over the last 60 years - we must not throw the baby out with the bath water.

Emblematic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120809854#Comment_120809854

I would go further and sell off "TVNZ" or the the commercial arm of RTE here so that the playing field is level. Only subsidy would be through a commissioning or funding body that does not itself broadcast or stream. Funding body would have a very well defined remit making oversight easier.

Sam Russell

I think a wholly commercial TV station already exists - TV3 or Virgin Media - which shows ITV programmes here - wall to wall, plus low budget US programmes and repeats of very old editions of programmes - time and time again. No thank you.

RTE have gone through these troubled times before, but have had some fantastic successes as well. The news output is good, and less biased than the BBC. Up there with Ch4 output - produced by ITN.

Their drama has had flops and success - given the reduced finance available to them.

Light entertainment - not so good. The LLS has fallen relentlessly with Tubs waving his arms about, fiddling with the button that does not close on his jacket, and giving 'one for everyone in the audience!'. The fall in audience numbers should have been enough to show him the door, not give him under the table payments. He should have been moved to children's programmes which I feel is where his talent shines.

Comedy has not been funny for RTE - ever.

The whole of RTE needs a fundamental reset. They have many excellent people working there but there is a rotten smell coming from somewhere.

We need a national broadcaster and RTE should be it, but fund it better, and not just by upping the licence fee. They need to create content that the public want to watch, and advertisers need to get their adverts seen. No sponsors of programmes, no presenter names on programmes, and no side deals.

No-one negotiates with Tesco on price - you pay what it says. That is the style RTE should have with its advertisers and staff - tempered by the market.

Emblematic

However there's a very limited price range the likes of Tesco can charge for something. Charge too high for an own-brand loaf of bread and shoppers go elsewhere. Charge too little and there's no profit: they are already squeezing suppliers to the maximum. Tesco know pretty quickly if they've got the price wrong on some item.

Although I have absolutely no experience in TV advertising (or retail sales for that matter), I would imagine that selling TV advertising is very different, a bit more like selling houses with bidding and negotiation being more common.

That said, I'm sure RTE could have been a lot more frugal with their corporate hospitality and junkets.

spuddy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120809854#Comment_120809854

That's a great idea

icdg

It wasn’t meant to be! 97 years of heritage thrown away seems like a horrible prospect.

But the more this runs on and on the more i fear that will be exactly the outcome.

I don’t think the politicians will let it happen though. They have more to lose than anyone else from the loss of a PSB - if News and coverage of parliamentary affairs is gone altogether or exiled to late night.

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120816014#Comment_120816014

Yep all our political parties are ideologically committed to PSB and would never contemplate letting it die, even if they are no longer necessarily committed to RTE as an institution. We don't have the kind of right-libertarian parties whowould be willing to stand up and say " To hell with PSB, let the market decide what people watch/listen to...

icdg

It’s not even about ideology. Politics survives on media coverage. Otherwise how does anyone know what they are doing.

But commercial broadcasters are not interested in it, or at best don’t want it in prime time.

Politicians need media coverage. They need a PSB that is willing to show a Six One, a Nine OClock News, a Prime Time. Not a late night show that airs when most people are asleep.

And that’s why something will survive. Maybe not RTE as we know it, though.

SPDUB

I see that Leo has now said that he wants reform of the licence fee to happen during the life of this government

That's a big change from the long fingering they were doing before

Change needed at top of RTÉ, Taoiseach says (rte.ie)