RTÉ announce restructuring plans [MOD WARNING POST #5 PLEASE READ]

mike2084 · 07-11-2019 1:09am #1

DAB to close apparently, as well as studios in Limerick gone and Aertel to close as well.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2019/1106/1089209-rte-cuts/

Atlantic Dawn · 07-11-2019 8:09am

mike2084 wrote: »

DAB to close apparently, as well as studios in Limerick gone and Aertel to close as well.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2019/1106/1089209-rte-cuts/

Most countries are closing their fm transmission and moving to DAB, I'm surprised RTE didn't pull the plug on the RTE Player and continue with Aertel.

yosser hughes · 07-11-2019 8:15am

mike2084 wrote: »

DAB to close apparently, as well as studios in Limerick gone and Aertel to close as well.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2019/1106/1089209-rte-cuts/

No mention of closing 2FM or whatever it's called now. It beggars belief why they are keeping that open and how they justify keeping it open.

hurleronditch · 07-11-2019 9:19am

elperello wrote: »

Sell things off.
Close things down.
Fire staff.

Doesn't sound too well thought out to me.

What would you propose?

Sounds exactly like what any public or private body would do when they have a massive expenditure to income problem

icdg · 07-11-2019 9:44am

MOD:

Now that the announcement has been formally made, we can use this thread to discuss.

The usual warning in relation to RTE threads applies. This isn’t a “dump your RTE related rant here” thread. There are now tangible proposals.. Personal attacks whether against RTE personalities or fellow posters aren’t allowed. Straight 48 hour ban for breaches.

The plan:
https://about.rte.ie/2019/11/06/rte-announces-plan-to-address-key-issues-fight-for-its-future-and-for-public-service-media-in-ireland/

The main points:
* Closure of DAB and all DAB only stations
* RTE Guide for sale
* Sports to move primarily to RTÉ One
* Limerick studios to close, Lyric FM to move to Dublin/Cork
* Aertel to close (requires primary legislation though)
* RTE NSO to transfer to NCH
* Costs (inc staffing) to be reduced significantly, management team to take 10% cut, non executive board members to waive fees.

To those asking what the sports move does - it means more pre-emptions of regular home made programmes (most of which is on RTÉ One), and that’s where the cost reduction will be.

Elmo · 07-11-2019 11:09am

icdg wrote: »

MOD:

Now that the announcement has been formally made, we can use this thread to discuss.

The usual warning in relation to RTE threads applies. This isn’t a “dump your RTE related rant here” thread. There are now tangible proposals.. Personal attacks whether against RTE personalities or fellow posters aren’t allowed. Straight 48 hour ban for breaches.

The plan:
https://about.rte.ie/2019/11/06/rte-announces-plan-to-address-key-issues-fight-for-its-future-and-for-public-service-media-in-ireland/

The main points:
* Closure of DAB and all DAB only stations
* RTE Guide for sale
* Sports to move primarily to RTÉ One
* Limerick studios to close, Lyric FM to move to Dublin/Cork
* Aertel to close (requires primary legislation though)
* RTE NSO to transfer to NCH
* Costs (inc staffing) to be reduced significantly, management team to take 10% cut, non executive board members to waive fees.

To those asking what the sports move does - it means more pre-emptions of regular home made programmes (most of which is on RTÉ One), and that’s where the cost reduction will be.

I think the Closure of the Radio stations will need Ministerial Permission under the Broadcasting Act 2009,

*Ministerial consent for new services and variations in channels.*

103.—(1) A corporation may, with the consent of the Minister,
pursue the objects in paragraphs (g) and (h) of section 114(1) or
paragraphs (g) and (h) of section 118(1), as the case may be.
(2) A corporation may, with the consent of the Minister, vary the
number of television or sound broadcasting channels it operates.
(3) A corporation may, with the consent of the Minister, undertake ancillary services.
(4) Where the Minister proposes to give his or her consent under
this section, the Minister shall—
(a) consult with the corporation concerned and such other
persons as he or she considers appropriate,
(b) consult with the Authority as to the sectoral impact of a
proposal under this section,
(c) consider the public value of such proposal, and
(d) publish in such manner as he or she considers appropriate
a statement outlining the consultations that have been
carried out under paragraphs (a) and (b) and indicate a
place at which any document given to the Minister by a
person referred to in paragraph (a) or (b) in the course of
consultations under those paragraphs may be inspected.

Dropping all Digital Radio stations would vary the amount of channels.

Elmo · 07-11-2019 11:11am

It will be interesting to see if they move mid-week sports to RTÉ ONE to reduce really only Fair City, outside of that Weekend sports don't really effect Schedules on ONE and your just moving the sports from 2 to ONE.

RTÉ ONE's audience won't grow enough to mitigate against the losses at RTÉ2 due to this move.

It's really a death by a thousand cuts.

I really can't see them moving FAI coverage over to ONE on a Friday night.

Maysa07 · 07-11-2019 11:15am

MOD: a link to this was already provided. You don’t need to break up the thread by copying and pasting (unattributed, by the way) part of a long press release from RTE

odyssey06 · 07-11-2019 11:19am

Maysa07 wrote: »

11% (and growing) of households do not pay the TV Licence, but can still consume RTÉ programming and content on the RTÉ Player. This means a further loss of €20 million in public funding annually.

I presume you are quoting this from somewhere else, but these figures are fantasy stuff.

Tow · 07-11-2019 11:22am

yosser hughes wrote: »

No mention of closing 2FM or whatever it's called now. It beggars belief why they are keeping that open and how they justify keeping it open.

If does not cost much in front line staff to run a music station. With modern systems a DJ can record a 3 hour show in 30 minutes etc i.e. record a show in the morning before going to their 9 to 5 job, or a week's worth of programming a day etc.

However, I have been told by a former RTE producer that is takes an inordinate amount of time for some of their old timers to record a single music show. In this case for RTE 1. They are from an era when the engineer 'pressed the buttons' and they just talked between songs.

Maysa07 · 07-11-2019 11:52am

odyssey06 wrote: »

I presume you are quoting this from somewhere else, but these figures are fantasy stuff.

It's the overall evasion rates. If RTE could capture that % it is projected that it could 'gain' 20 mill

odyssey06 · 07-11-2019 12:00pm

Maysa07 wrote: »

It's the overall evasion rates. If RTE could capture that % it is projected that it could 'gain' 20 mill

'If', 'could' ... they're not real figures. RTE make it seem like they'd get every cent of that €20 million.
It presumes that ALL of the households in that 11% would actually need a TV licence AND are accessing the joke that is the RTE player.

Maysa07 · 07-11-2019 1:14pm

odyssey06 wrote: »

'If', 'could' ... they're not real figures. RTE make it seem like they'd get every cent of that €20 million.
It presumes that ALL of the households in that 11% would actually need a TV licence AND are accessing the joke that is the RTE player.

What it shows is, the collection method is broke, The licence fee is broke, People don't consume their chosen content from a little box in the corner of the room anymore. It has to change quickly.

dulpit · 07-11-2019 1:19pm

Maysa07 wrote: »

What it shows is, the collection method is broke, The licence fee is broke, People don't consume their chosen content from a little box in the corner of the room anymore. It has to change quickly.

And to be fair to RTÉ, that's not something that they have control over - that's the government's job, and they won't do it as it'll be unpopular...

Elmo · 07-11-2019 1:28pm

dulpit wrote: »

And to be fair to RTÉ, that's not something that they have control over - that's the government's job, and they won't do it as it'll be unpopular...

But RTÉ are also big enough and old enough to know that all ministers have dragged their feet over the last 10 years.

Its a rotating minister at best, there have been 6 ministers in 10 years.

iseegirls · 07-11-2019 5:27pm

Would anyone be enticed at purchasing the RTE Guide? I'd say the Christmas edition must be a good pay day, but magazine sales have been in decline in the past decade. Maybe the owners of TV Now may take a look and merge both together.

MEGA BRO WOLF 5000 · 07-11-2019 5:31pm

What do people think of this “broadcasting charge”... RTÉ losing money hand over fist with the way the current license stands. If the charge is handed over to revenue to collect will the people vote with their feet and oppose it like the water charges or will they roll over and accept it like everything else?

Elmo · 07-11-2019 5:46pm

Hunky Monster wrote: »

What do people think of this “broadcasting charge”... RTÉ losing money hand over fist with the way the current license stands. If the charge is handed over to revenue to collect will the people vote with their feet and oppose it like the water charges or will they roll over and accept it like everything else?

My own opinion is that it should be added to your Telecommunications bill from PAYG phones, business phones, broadband charges, on-demand players and so on. It would be a small amount on every such bill, and if you don't want to pay you don't have to get Broadband, television or phone.

political analyst · 07-11-2019 6:00pm

Why did RTÉ establish digital-only radio stations in the first place?!

Will Radio 1, 2FM and Lyric FM still be available on Saorview?

Elmo · 07-11-2019 6:01pm

political analyst wrote: »

Why did RTÉ establish digital-only radio stations in the first place?!

Will Radio 1, 2FM and Lyric FM still be available on Saorview?

As part of the tests for DAB. Yes Radio 1, 2FM, Lyric FM and RnaG will remain on Saorview.

hotmail.com · 07-11-2019 9:12pm

I note they want to move major sporting events to RTE One.

How is this going to be possible with the RTE news bulletins. And surely RTE 2 will become completely irrelevant.

dublinman1990 · 07-11-2019 9:41pm

I heard from some people online that this new integrated media centre to be built on Montrose will be an entirely brand new radio centre for RTÉ. This would be built after more land is sold off at Montrose first. They plan to open it at the Nutley Lane end of the RTÉ campus. There will be fewer radio studios built for this new media centre at Donnybrook. There are 13 radio studios based underground at their current radio centre. They will all be gone once this new centre is open.

Also; after hearing from the 6.1 News tonight that more proposals are to be discussed between trade unions & RTÉ. Will RTÉ go ahead with plans to sell off all of their transmissions network known as 2RN. I know that the Sunday Times did an article on this possible move some time ago. It said in the article that it was worth €200 million. Is that assessment accurate from RTÉ? Will that actually go ahead now in future? Thanks.

L1011 · 07-11-2019 9:58pm

iseegirls wrote: »

Would anyone be enticed at purchasing the RTE Guide? I'd say the Christmas edition must be a good pay day, but magazine sales have been in decline in the past decade. Maybe the owners of TV Now may take a look and merge both together.

Post Publications (Sunday Business Post and now some other magazines recently acquired) will buy it if the price is right.

Zird · 07-11-2019 10:31pm

I don't understand why they've announced the axing of Aertel when to do so requires primary legislation, they were waiting for years to get permission to remove RTE jr from rte2 and nothing happened, they should know from their experience of trying to close LW 252 that every gobshote politician is likely to object

Zird · 07-11-2019 10:42pm

If the RTE guide is sold, will the new owner also have to licence the rights to use the name RTE ?

L1011 · 07-11-2019 11:08pm

Zird wrote: »

If the RTE guide is sold, will the new owner also have to licence the rights to use the name RTE ?

Yes. A price and initial period (5 years is the norm) would have to be included in any sale agreement. There would probably also be a set in stone advertising contra deal for that time period.

The BBC Magazines spinoff gives an obvious example to copy here.

icdg · 08-11-2019 12:40am

hotmail.com wrote: »

I note they want to move major sporting events to RTE One.

How is this going to be possible with the RTE news bulletins. .

Well that of course is the exact idea. Moving to RTE One means that, instead of imports being displaced, home produced programming is instead, resulting in savings. The plan is not without its flaws. It’s one of these things that viewed in the abstract, makes viewers think “Sure what difference does that make?”

Until a major news story breaks on a big European football night...

Lest some think this is academic, RTE will broadcast 16 Champions League games every season under the current contract, 8 European Qualifiers in the Euro 2020 campaign and a similar number in a typical Euro/WC. That’s a lot of opportunities there.

Zird · 08-11-2019 12:47am

icdg wrote: »

Well that of course is the exact idea. Moving to RTE One means that, instead of imports being displaced, home produced programming is instead, resulting in savings. The plan is not without its flaws. It’s one of these things that viewed in the abstract, makes viewers think “Sure what difference does that make?”

Until a major news story breaks on a big European football night...

Lest some think this is academic, RTE will broadcast 16 Champions League games every season under the current contract, 8 European Qualifiers in the Euro 2020 campaign and a similar number in a typical Euro/WC. That’s a lot of opportunities there.

incidentally, they always drop fair city anyway on nights when football is on RTE 2 and show a repeat of something like Rachel Allen or the Brennan brothers instead.

Maysa07 · 08-11-2019 10:47am

Most of this is accurate.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/at-rt%C3%A9-briefing-staff-reacted-with-cat-calls-and-boos-1.4076106

Elmo · 08-11-2019 11:36am

Zird wrote: »

incidentally, they always drop fair city anyway on nights when football is on RTE 2 and show a repeat of something like Rachel Allen or the Brennan brothers instead.

They've being doing this for a while, they should know that it cause RTÉ ONE to see an audience drop, the soaps are able to hold of that audience drop and not effect the audience for the sporting event.

Most of this is accurate.

If so why is the board standing for these changes?

Maysa07 · 08-11-2019 12:02pm

Elmo wrote: »

They've being doing this for a while, they should know that it cause RTÉ ONE to see an audience drop, the soaps are able to hold of that audience drop and not effect the audience for the sporting event.

If so why is the board standing for these changes?

Sorry, what do you mean?

RTÉ announce restructuring plans [MOD WARNING POST #5 PLEASE READ]

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