Tom Clonan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I have to declare a conflict of interest. I am a member of the NUJ and have been for 23 years. I have had issues that were very well dealt with by the secretary general, Mr. Dooley. I just wanted to put that on the record. The other conflict of interest I have is that I have been in and out of RTÉ for 24 years as a security analyst, less so recently for whatever reason, and I have found all the staff I have met in Montrose to be extremely hardworking. Sometimes when I drive through the UK, which has a population of more than 60 million which supports the BBC, I listen to the standard of broadcasting and television output in the UK. It is extraordinary what is produced here. The quality of public service broadcasting is high. The public service broadcaster has highlighted many of the issues that brought me into this institution and continues to do so unfailingly.

My question is about the culture and governance of RTÉ. I have not have been a public servant since 1987. One of the things about the disbursement of public funds is the absolute perception of fairness. What struck me over the summer in the committee hearings on RTÉ is the shocking levels of unfairness in RTÉ, the different categories and classifications of workers. There has been a lot of mention of the bogus contracts. I will ask a specific question about equal pay for equal work, which is a fundamental trade union principle.

In RTÉ there are categories of workers who earn far more than their colleagues, some are on contracts and some are employees. When presenters who are paid very high salaries on contract take a break and are replaced by another presenter, is the replacement presenter paid the same amount of money? I am concerned about this because in a number of cases - this is not a criticism of the presenters; it is a question about management's disbursement of funds - male presenters who are very highly paid take a break, go on leave or whatever they do, they are replaced by a female presenter. Is that female presenter paid the same, like pay for like work? In other cases it may be that female presenters on contract are replaced by male presenters. When it comes to disbursement of public funds, it is important there is pay parity.