Mr. Noel Curran:

That will include contractors. Please remember that England has 17 times our population. Historically, only one or two of our people earned that amount. When the process is done no one will earn that amount.

A balanced approach is necessary when comparing RTE with the UK. When I have talked about salaries I have been upfront in stating that the fees being paid were too high and that it was RTE's fault. Without justifying the fees in any way, one does need to recognise the value of RTE presenters. RTE is dual-funded and relies on commercial income. The public respond incredibly positively to the presenters. Let us make UK comparisons. The weekend reach by the "Marian Finucane Show" is two and half times the comparative reach on BBC's Radio Four. BBC's "Newsnight" gets about 9% share in the UK, "Channel 4 News" gets about 3% but "Prime Time" gets over 30% and RTE news bulletins get about 40%. Since Marian Finucane moved to her Saturday show her audience has increased by 51% and her Sunday audience has increased by 47%. Even given the latest reductions, Joe Duffy's audience has increased by 53% since he moved to his new time slot. Miriam O'Callaghan presents a current affairs show, a top ten radio show and one of our largest home produced television shows in the summer. I needed to say all that otherwise one ends up in a confrontational situation, particularly when driving down salaries. It would be easy for me to grandstand, to say how much we have reduced the salaries and say that we are great. That is not what I mean. We realised that the public had a concern and took action which is ongoing. We will review salaries when contracts end. Value exists, particularly with comparisons. The value is determined by the person out front and his or her team. Many people who are not in the top ten list deliver an equal amount of value. There must be some recognition of public value.

In answer to the Deputy's question, we realised that the public were concerned and took action. I am not seeking a pat on the back. I do not know of any other area of the economy where salaries or fees have been reduced to this level and we are not finished the process.

One could get into all sorts of questions on who can afford the salaries. We consider a range of factors when deciding fees such as audience share, whether the presenter is replaceable, the schedule, the position on the schedule, the commercial revenue and all of that. RTE's competitors do not publish fees. Interestingly, several newspapers recently published estimations of fees.

According to our market intelligence, our fees are at a level where, if we amalgamated RTE and the commercial sector, four of the top ten would be from commercial radio. This is due to the reductions we have made. This is certainly not a criticism and they deserve whatever money they are going to get from their employers. I cannot confirm that completely because we do not have the figures, but these are indications. We have made inroads and we are pulling these figures down while valuing the contribution people make.

I ask Mr. Kevin Bakhurst to respond to questions on the "The Frontline" and "Prime Time".