Dee Forbes banging the RTE TV licence drum again 60m uncollected fee *poll not working - pl ignore*

Idbatterim wrote: »

This gave RTÉ total revenue of €339.1 million last year. Its total operating costs, however, were €339.8 million, and once a depreciation and amortisation charge and other factors were taken into account, it made a loss of €13 million.

Service by service
The biggest cost centre for RTÉ is television, and within this RTÉ One. The flagship channel cost €140.2 million to run last year, its annual report shows.

What is even worse is the vast majority of its commerical income comes from TV yet it didn't cut funding to radio! 30million from RTÉ2 alone.

Also in relation to expenses The current DG got a 50,000 euro moving fee, from what I gather while she did move from London, her home was in Cork. So her pay cut is pretty much paying that back.

LuasSimon wrote: »

Fair City-Eastenders-The Simpsons and Home and away seem to be on non stop on one of the RTE channels , St Patricks day hardly had any Irish themed programmes on .
TnaG on a shoestring budget compared to RTE has a huge amount of local programmes of interest and has a load of GAA matchs-laochra gael etc and plenty of rugby. I wish i could give my TV license money to TnaG alone who arent paying out oligarch wages to South Dublin bigheads.

tg4 is a single channel, where as rte is a multi-channel broadcaster with multiple channels across radio and tv.
an operation with 1 channel is obviously going to be way way less costly to run compared to a multi-channel operation the size of rte.
and rte wouldn't cost anything near the bbc for example, which is an even bigger operation again.

end of the road wrote: »

tg4 is a single channel, where as rte is a multi-channel broadcaster with multiple channels across radio and tv.
an operation with 1 channel is obviously going to be way way less costly to run compared to a multi-channel operation the size of rte.
and rte wouldn't cost anything near the bbc for example, which is an even bigger operation again.

Still your talking 2 to 3 times the amount to run RTÉ2 as it is does TG4, both have similar schedules in terms of children’s (TG4 have to dub cartoons RTÉ2 does not).

NIMAN wrote: »

Is it just me or does there seem to be a ramping up of the tv licence adverts on tv and radio?

Every other institution is looking at ways of making it easier for those with reduced incomes to survive, rte still trying to scare you with these.

Have you noticed they're doing the 'if you wish to live in IReland, and own a television, you are required to get a TV license'...

Maybe it's just me, but it's got sinister overtones to it... like, imagine if you were someone who moved to IReland from a foreign country. You'd hear that and be scared you'd be deported for not having one.

end of the road wrote: »

yes but then again tg4 probably doesn't buy programming which may be as costly as what rte buys.
i think every station both radio and tv in the country will probably have different costs outside their main core costs.
this is why people comparing tg4 to rte as a whole doesn't work for me, comparing it to a specific channel is fair enough.

So firstly there are issues at TG4. I am not putting them on a pedestal. There are many things that TG4 have done well and then there are other programmes that they have completely messed up and I don't think they are doing as well as they have done in the past. However TG4 at the very least make more TV than RTÉ2 (outside of Sport and even then TG4 with their budget have been fairly successfully with sporting rights).

With that out of the way I am going to go back to RTÉ and take your points on them on board in relation to TG4.

1. Buying in programming costs much less than to make programming. TG4 would not be in a position to spend 10m - 12m on imports, as RTÉ do for RTÉ2. Overall RTÉ spend 25m on imports and this has never been cut.

2. While, I think RTÉ spend too much on imports, I disagree with Virgin Media's complaint that they are being anti-competitive in this area. This is due to the fact that TG4 and Channel 6 were both able to buy in that market. Largely Virgin Media (and TV3 before them) stayed away from the shows RTÉ bought in, relying initially on a deal with Fireworks (which was also owned by CanWest) and then a deal with Granada Studios (when Granada took a share in TV3 from 2001) and now large just with ITV.

3. You are right to suggest that you shouldn't compare one service with another, however outside of sport there is very little else produced by RTÉ2. Almost all children's programming are imports, none of which have to be re-dub into Irish. RTÉ have largely forgotten children and there is no excuse for this. RTÉ should support Children's content, it cut and cut and cut while at the same time increasing licence fee funding to 2FM and continuing to spend 25m on imports. That's not to say that TG4 have done much better in commissioning children's programming.

4. In comparison to RTÉ2 TG4 provide a lot more home produced content. (Again outside of sport). And while RTÉ have upped there support to the RTÉ Player those "exclusive" shows are 10 times worst then shows that had been previously been produced for RTÉ2, which would naturally end up on the Player.

5. Just take a look at what both RTÉ2 and TG4 provide. From 7am to 4:30 on RTÉ2 children's content, from 7am to 12pm and then from 2pm to 6pm children's content on TG4, both services have 3hours of non-Irish non-children's imports during the day. From 7pm to 11pm imports on RTÉ2, with TG4 providing a mix of both, and both cover sport at the weekend. Yes both channels will have different views on content, as they should, as they serve different audiences. Spend on Irish programming is massively down on RTÉ2, something TG4 could never allow happen due to its remit, which then leads to the question what exactly is RTÉ2's remit in RTÉ?

ShamNNspace wrote: »

#washyerhands... an yer mouth out with soap while yer at it that man has done the state some service #Duffyforpresident

:D Good one;)

Gen.Zhukov wrote: »

I saw a bit of a promo for another new series for Sundays.

Apparently it's about "Celebs" going back to the house they were raised in. I think Brendan Courtney has the gig (for a change)

Anne Doyle is one of the celebs.

W.T.A.F.

Knowing RTE, they'll be buying a house for Anne and all the other 'celebs'...

sligojoek wrote: »

To be "done up" by Dermot Bannon with Diarmud Gavin doing the garden

Touch of sourness dhhrifting into this platform recently.

Uhmmmmm....:)

They should ditch ads on RTE Player so that it works perfectly during the Corona Virus. When Adblocker worked for it the user experience was similar to BBC iPlayer.

Overall the amount of clap trap coming from independent media & RTÉ is really irritating it’s as much if they think that they’ve being doing a good job over the last ten years.

It’s expensive to take an ad out in a local newspaper.

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

This was usually peddled out quite regularly, that "if we didn't pay the big money, the top 'talent' would be off"

I say call their bluff, tell Tubbers et all their fee's are being reduced to €200,000 per annum, max! (and are capped at that), and if the grass is greener somewhere else like England or the private TV sector, wish them the best of luck, and off they go.

RTÉ (and us by extension, as we pay for it) can't be held to ransom by a hypothetical situation that will most likely never happen.

Who in the fcuk is going to employ Joe Duffy, Miriam O'Callaghan, Ray D'Arcy, Ryan Tubridy or any of the other 'talent' in RTÉ and pay them more that €100,000 a year??

Why give them a limit of €200k, that's still way too much for what they do?

Otherwise, I agree with you and would actually go a step further and not renew any of their contacts - save RTE a fortune, while doing the majority of their viewers and listeners a big favour by getting rid of the lot of them!

They're isn't one person that you've named there, that couldn't be replaced by someone equally capable, if not better, for under €100k pa.

end of the road wrote: »

and yet, rte aren't replacing the high earners with all those people who can apparently meet the same criteria, bring in the same audience and advertising, who are as capable or more so, for under 100k.
which suggests, it may not be so easy to find such individuals after all?
i have no doubt, if rte could get individuals more capable then the current lot for under 100k, they would jump at the chance.
there is plenty of talent, and some non-talent, across the broadcast industry, however no matter how good one may be in an individual's opinion, if they do not fit what the broadcaster is looking for, they won't get the gig, and that goes for any broadcaster public or private.

RTÉ aren’t known for nurturing new talent. Few programmes fewer Opertunities for different presenters.

end of the road wrote: »

and yet, rte aren't replacing the high earners with all those people who can apparently meet the same criteria, bring in the same audience and advertising, who are as capable or more so, for under 100k.
which suggests, it may not be so easy to find such individuals after all?
i have no doubt, if rte could get individuals more capable then the current lot for under 100k, they would jump at the chance.
there is plenty of talent, and some non-talent, across the broadcast industry, however no matter how good one may be in an individual's opinion, if they do not fit what the broadcaster is looking for, they won't get the gig, and that goes for any broadcaster public or private.

Suggests RTE haven’t the balls to get get their salaries down to a realistic level.