Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 20 January 2022

Public Accounts Committee

2020 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 33: Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media
Programme E - Broadcasting

9:30 am

Mr. Richard Collins:

Let me go back. We put a plan in place in 2019 and there were three elements to that plan. The first part was stabilising and diversifying commercial revenues, the second part was controlling our costs and reforming them and the third part was additional public funding. The first two elements of that were under our control or substantially under our control, and I would say we have delivered on those. If we look at commercial revenues, I know we are talking about 2020 here but in 2021 we have grown them and they are nearly back to where they were in 2018. On the costs, as I have just said, we have delivered most of those cost savings, albeit in a different manner from how we had planned to do it. It is the third element that is outstanding, the public funding element, and that is a big part of the plan. If that is not delivered, we will still have a big gap in the bottom line going forward. That is where the issue is. For the parts that are under RTÉ's control, we have a plan or are working to those. Closing RTÉ 2 was not part of the original plan so it is not something we are looking at.

Comments

No comments

Log in or join to post a public comment.