Mr. Scott Williams:

It is our silver anniversary. While we are silver of hair, we are gold of achievement. I thank Deputy Michael Moynihan for congratulating us.

I will make some introductory remarks before answering the question. We are not anti-RTE, which has come across clearly to the committee. We require RTE to be strong and vibrant because we are all part of one sector. There are many initiatives that we conduct with it for the betterment of broadcasting in its many facets. The real elephant in the room is non-indigenous broadcasters. In 2011 there was €879 million worth of television revenue in Ireland, of which a full 43% or €382 million went to Sky Television. Some €225 million went to RTE. At the heart of the point I am making is the fact that we are indigenous. We are just one half of the indigenous equation in the country; RTE is the other half. We very much share its views on that point. We share views on many other points also.

RTE is required under section 108 to maximise its commercial opportunities. That is a statutory requirement. We do not blame RTE for this as it operates under statute. However, we believe it is now inappropriate. RTE's report for 2013 is a long document and contained in it is a lot of fine detail. I found it quite interesting to consider how the allocation of licence fee revenue was achieved. RTE allocates public funding to individual services proportionate to the net cost of the service. The net cost is the gross cost after deducting the contribution from commercial activities. In other words, public funding fills a hole in the budget for a service. We believe this is intrinsically wrong. In other words, whatever is short is made up with public money. When times were good — we hope they will be again at some time in our lives — RTE produced huge surpluses. For what was the licence fee money being used? One should make the analysis and think it through.

Section 108 requires RTE to maximise its commercial mandate. All broadcasting in Ireland is both commercial and public service in nature. Why is it a public service? In this regard, members will have heard the chairman's points. They will agree with us that we provide a very valuable public service throughout the country. We are also commercial. When the Radio and Television Act 1988 was being introduced, the then Minister described the new sector as something that would be akin to public service broadcasting in private hands. How right he was. That is what we have achieved in 25 years. This is the time to rebalance.

We need a level playing pitch as we proceed. When we started, the level was tilted in the State broadcaster's favour. We have managed to bring the listenership over to the other side, but, unfortunately, the funding is still all going in the other direction. We want a level playing pitch in order that the entire broadcasting sector, including RTE and independent broadcasters, can thrive, perhaps not as brothers but certainly as valuable colleagues. We will always compete.

Let me make a point on value and changing section 108. Only last week the former Minister, Deputy Pat Rabbitte, spoke about evasion in the order of 15% of licence fee revenue which is the equivalent of €25 million to €30 million. He referred to "valuable revenue lost to RTE." I was horrified. Why should RTE receive another €25 million to €30 million when it has just produced a small profit for the first time in seven years? The €25 million to €30 million in additional funding is where there is an opportunity for legislators to rebalance. It is from the additional money found that we believe action can be taken and moneys apportioned.

With regard to the licence fee, when €9.72 goes to An Post for the collection of the licence fee, somebody needs to ask why it is so expensive to make us all pay up.