John O'Mahony (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Curran for his presentation on the two issues of the structures introduced to ensure editorial standards and the budgetary situation in RTE. Obviously we all welcome the editorial standards in the aftermath of "The Frontline" presidential debate and the Fr. Kevin Reynolds programme.

It is linked to the budgetary issue. How many legal claims is RTE facing and what has been the cost to RTE of legal claims in 2011, 2012 and 2013?

I will not go into any great detail on salaries, but the arguments in the past for paying high salaries to top presenters were that they brought in advertising and RTE did not want to lose them to other Irish broadcasters. There are not as many places for them to go as there were in the past and advertising revenue has been decreasing. I presume the salaries of the top presenters will continue to fall. When Ireland's top presenter over many decades, Gay Byrne, retired it was widely reported he had been paid £200,000 a year not to go anywhere else. I presume such payments are no longer made by RTE.

I have a particular interest in sport, and it is a cornerstone of RTE. Is the budgetary situation impacting on broadcasting main sporting events on terrestrial television in Ireland, including GAA coverage? The cost of broadcasting soccer, rugby and GAA includes the cost of pundits and I note some of the top earners in RTE are pundits. The only time soccer pundits appear is with regard to the Champions League. How does the rate of pay for pundits on RTE compare between soccer, rugby and GAA?

The chairman of the Independent Broadcasters of Ireland, IBI, recently suggested collaboration between independent broadcasters and RTE. Some time ago RTE announced it would close regional studios. Could there be collaboration between local radio stations on overlapping the use of facilities in the regions? It is a different market and rather than being rivals they could combine resources. I am interested to hear the comments of the witnesses on this suggestion. Several years ago RTE announced it would close regional studios and go into institutes of technology. How is this progressing? It did not seem to make sense when I heard it.