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

Prime time tonight.

Miriam talking about rte money crisis and overpaid staff, with no shame whatsoever

250k to appear on the radio once a week for an hour or so, and introduce 2 pieces to camera on PT for maybe a handful of mins

And they wonder why they are in trouble. Or David McCullough reading the 6 1 news for 195k.

RTe interviewing themselves discussing the trauma of having to take a pay cut.

Sadly, we all know it's the folks who genuinely had to take the hardest pay cuts who'll be cut like chaff. It'll be interesting to see how or if the pay cuts will be genuinely implemented.

I remember a few months back Claire Byrne became 'emotional' (or as emotional as an automaton can get) on her radio show. I'd say she was crying because she knew a pay cut was on the way.

They even interviewed Larry Bass... but failed to mention he used to be on the RTE board.

Wasn't this the same guy who was whining that if the license fee wasn't increased, there'd be no Dancing with the Stars?

The best two channels were the +1 channels

Especially watching sport on rte 2 +1

How much could those channels actually cost to run?

Have you not heard of VCR's

That's Larry Bass ShinAwil and Moya Doherty's Tyrone Productions.

Mad how the same names keep cropping up.

You would hope that he is the genuine article... but will RTÉ/Unions break him before he can fix RTÉ?

as ultimately any 'fixing' that takes place is going to mean a lot of freeloaders & deadwood management getting the chop, or having their obscene salaries chopped, so naturally they will try to block him at every single turn, and make his plan nigh on impossible to implement...

Direct exchequer funding is the easiest at the moment politically as a new tax would go down very badly.

It does carry a lot of long term risk. It would make RTE beholden to the department and charges of at least passive influence over news reporting would be easy to make. It would also mean that it would be a fund to be squeezed during lean economic times.

There is no easy political choice as all carry risk.

My bet is that there will be some kind of media charge that other media companies, web and print will have access to as well as RTE. Government will likely look for cross party support for this.

If every media outlet gets some sweeties the thinking will be that opposition won't be able to mass. The bitter pill will be swallowed.

We thought that with Forbes. An outsider who actually had a relevant and impressive CV.

The first outside DG in RTEs history.

Kevin is basically a journalist and editor and has worked for RTE before.

I also hope he does well do but I doubt it.

I used to pay the TV licence but stopped when the TUBS thing blew up. It would only be going to pay back taxes etc at this point.

Will it ever be collected through Revenue ? I believe not. Just another water charge.

Having seen the reports of funding on the News and articles online, my personal view is that RTE should be let go to the wolves. If it is THAT important that the government want to give them 50million a year of tax payers money (despite license fees, advertising costs, revenue for RTE Guide(which must make a loss) ) I think it time that privatisation happens.

In the current climate of streaming/foreign channels/internet channels etc., how many people actually watch RTE?

I know I am abroad but I never watch RTE despite having access to it.

Even when home it never appears on my TV or my families TV's.

With all the changes coming through in Broadcasting, why should tax payers fork out an additional 50M a year on top of licensing to pay for what is basically an arm of the government, that is increasingly broadcasting to a smaller and smaller audience?

I thought double taxation was illegal? TV License AND More Government (tax payers) funding?..;)

Let it go, sell it off and let it sink or swim.

RTE is a poor PSB but that is in no way an argument that we should not have a PSB.

Given that RTÉ had an obvious unfair advantage over independent theatre producers, why did the competition authority not intervene on the grounds of the Toy Show Musical being an abuse of supremacy in the market under EU law?

RTÉ did not just fail because of the licence fee. This idea that is going around that things would be different because RTÉ don't have to worry about the commercial side of things or that they are guaranteed an income.

RTÉ clearly didn't know how much money they had, they were like a child at the cookie jar.

"I will have one Mammy won't notice, ten minutes later, a sure I will take another one, who's going to notice 2 gone... a sure I may as well finish the jar she'll be mad as hell that I eat some many at this stage in anycase".

I don't see this culture changing. We don't live in their world.

They get over 10k into their bank accounts every month and then dip their hand in for some car allowances.

It would mean work, easier just to give them the money they want.

Really I don't understand peoples opposition to splitting the organization up, into smaller areas.

It would mean the top person wouldn't be on as much money, that each of the resulting companies would have to live with in their means (much like TG4), while providing independent Journalism, choice for audiences and opertunities for producers / creatives.

Its a win-win. IMO, but there is no doubt it would be hard work.

Dee Forbes sent a medical certificate to the Dail Public Accounts Committee (PAC) this week to say she is still unfit to testify before them

How long now?