Mr. Adrian Lynch:

It is interesting that the Senator mentioned those who stream content. I am director of audience channels and marketing for RTÉ. We continually carry out a significant amount of research on those who stream content and we can see the level of streaming currently going on from Disney+, Netflix and so on. These are global companies. For example, Netflix has 7,000 people working for it, 6,500 of whom just work on streaming technology. In order for us to compete, the first thing is that we need to be the key destination for original Irish content. The second thing is getting the technology right. We have done a significant amount of work this year on improving the user experience. In terms of the RTÉ player, the growth we have seen this year is approximately 74% in terms of streams that are consumed. It comes back to the financial challenges referred to in all three opening statements. When it comes to investment in technology, particularly in a country the size of Ireland with associated issues in terms of scalability and everything like that - it is different for Netflix - one needs a significant capital spend. If there are structural issues around financing, that can impede the ability to develop products that people will expect as basic hygiene.

On the issue of prominence, we are in the process of working with TG4 on a paper around prominence. Prominence is key in discoverability. Those present who have teenagers or younger children know they are consuming video in a totally different way. There are many various gateways such as pay television, be it Sky, Virgin Media and so on. It is really important for public service broadcasting to have anchor positions, be it within the electronic programme guide, EPG or, indeed, as we move towards Internet protocol, IP, in terms of an app. We do not want other companies disaggregating our content. We want our content to be findable.

In terms of the consumption of RTÉ news and current affairs content during the pandemic, the 9 o'clock news regularly has 900,000 viewers, but there has been massive consumption on the RTÉ player as well. Those in the 15-34 age cohort have shown significant consumption of and engagement with public media, which we think is really important.