Ms Moya Doherty:

Thank you. This is my last year as chair of the RTÉ board and perhaps prompted by this, I recently visited the RTÉ 60 Years of Television exhibition at the National Photographic Archive. There were many memories, many moments captured on stills camera and video. One particularly poignant moment, from 1974, was of children picketing the gates of RTÉ in protest at the decision to end the “Wanderly Wagon” programme. It was a glimpse of a more innocent time but it highlighted for me the paradox RTÉ has to deal with. The only way it can make savings is to cut services or programmes but doing so brings upon it the wrath of the audience it is seeking to serve. Happily, in 1974 the protesting children won the day and “Wanderly Wagon” continued for many a year.

It may have been a very different world in 1974 but even from when I was appointed to chair the RTÉ board almost eight years ago, the world has become a dramatically different place, not only for RTÉ as an organisation, but for the cultural identity of the nation. It is a genuinely existential moment for the provision of public service broadcasting in Ireland. This is the result of a critical confluence of factors, including, but not limited to, the emergence of the multiple content providers which we all know, for example, Apple, Sky and Amazon Prime; the relentless advance of social media into the personal lives of audiences across multiple levels and functions; the shift in advertising to highly targeted, data-driven platforms; the move from communal viewing and listening into niche narrow-casting to individuals and community interest groups; the rapid advance of multiple new technologies in the media space, which Douglas Rushkoff refers to as “the acceleration of the acceleration”; and the growth of political populism allied to a Wild West online environment in the provision of reliable information and analysis.

These profound shifts outline both the difficulties created for the national broadcaster and the increased importance of public service media at a time of unprecedented disruption. We need a thorough national public debate on all of these issues, a debate that is rooted in the public interest and does not shy away from uncomfortable truths, including the matter of public funding for the State broadcaster and our broken licence fee system.

This is a subject that the members’ predecessors on this committee made very clear recommendations on in 2017. The present model is resulting in huge losses, not only to RTÉ but to the independent sector. I have calculated these amount to be approximately €500 million in the past decade and nowhere has that been felt more than in the independent sector. I look forward to the publication of the report of The Future of Media Commission and, I hope, a clear plan for how the Government intends to implement its recommendations. I very much hope this committee will play its part in helping secure a sustainable future for a high quality and diverse media in Ireland.

I have spent much of my working life in and around public service broadcasting in the most all-embracing sense of that term. As chair of RTÉ, I have always believed that a fully funded, independent public service media, operating as the hub of a vibrant creative industries network, is fundamental to democracy. I am particularly mindful of RTÉ’s role in the provision of high-quality news and current affairs, something that has been particularly evident in recent times. I am proud to note the performance of RTÉ, the RTÉ executive and RTÉ staff during that intense pandemic period.

However, we must remain alive to the dangers faced by public service broadcasting, PSB. Just last month, Sir David Puttnam, once the digital champion for Ireland, resigned from the House of Lords citing this very issue as one of the reasons he had to make that decision. He argued that the government had ignored his report into digital technologies, public service media and democracy. He warned that political power was being “ceded to a few unelected and unaccountable digital corporations” and that a pandemic of misinformation and disinformation had taken hold. He said: “If allowed to flourish, these counterfeit truths will result in the collapse of public trust, and without trust democracy as we know it will simply decline into irrelevance.” Indeed, this real and present threat was the very reason I called for a future media commission to be established and I am grateful the Government did so.

This is not a problem particular to RTÉ. Many European public service models have different levels of funding and not all of them are provided with the funding that is needed to sustain the necessary level of service.

During my term as chair, I have worked with two directors general and constantly changing board personnel under four different Ministers. During this period, both RTÉ and the board have had to realign, as have many other public bodies, to ensure the highest standards of corporate governance.

The focus on governance must be at the heart of the board's work and is critical in ensuring public and stakeholder confidence. In the open forum of a board, occasions can arise where there is concern regarding the appropriateness of decisions that must be made. On such occasions, a consensus has to emerge. The emergence of this consensus can take time and careful negotiation, and I have consistently followed this protocol as chair. The specific case the committee has asked about was no different in this regard. Ultimately, however, each individual has to accept responsibility for the decisions he or she makes while the negotiated consensus is evolving.

Suffice it to say that it is clear that RTÉ takes its Irish language remit extremely seriously. However, issues such as the Irish language and the RTÉ strategy statement can no longer be addressed in isolation from the more nuanced understanding of the interconnected nature of this industry. RTÉ, at its best, can be the glue that binds the cultural well-being of the nation together. It can be the prism through which we construct the idea of ourselves, and it is often the voice of Ireland for the global diaspora.

The creative industries that RTÉ is at the centre of are at the forefront of a workplace upheaval, a revolution driven by a new understanding that if the first industrial revolution was driven by brawn and physical work and the second and third by brain and intellect, the fourth, in which we find ourselves, will be driven by an economy of the heart. This is not some fanciful romantic notion but a conviction that the work we do should be grounded in what we believe in, bring fulfilment and make a sustained contribution to the common good. All of us share the aspiration that RTÉ should be at the heart of this new era by embracing a public service model that can become the template for the rest of Europe.

After eight years as chair of RTÉ and public service media, my love and commitment for RTÉ are matched only by my concern for its future. Time is a commodity we no longer have. I thank the members very much for listening.