Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 48:

In page 45, between lines 26 and 27, to insert the following:

“Duties to the Irish Language

8. The Principal Act is amended by the insertion of the following section after section 39:

“Duties to the Irish Language

39A.(1) All audiovisual media service providers and sound media broadcasters in the State have a duty to support the promotion of the Irish language as the national language.

(2) The Commission shall examine the feasibility and merit of setting mandatory minimum content requirements for percentage of content in the Irish language through the awarding of television programme contract and sound broadcast contract licences to be introduced by 31 December 2030, with a higher obligation for public service broadcasters and local broadcasters service Gaeltacht areas, and with a view towards progressively increasing these content requirements over the periods from 2030 to 2035 and again from 2035 to 2040. The Commission shall publish a report no later than one year following its establishment, which shall be laid before the Minister, both Houses of the Oireachtas, and the Joint Oireachtas Committee, outlining the findings of this examination and proposing recommendations for the implementation of such mandatory minimum content requirements for the Irish language.”.”.

These amendments, as the Chairperson said, are related. Amendment No. 48 seeks a requirement for a certain percentage of broadcasting to be done as Gaeilge. Amendment No. 62 seeks to ensure a certain percentage of the music broadcast is in the Irish language or of European origin. Amendment No. 64 relates to a provision that may have been overtaken by Acht na dTeangacha Oifigiúla. That amendment would require 20% of advertising to be as Gaeilge. Beyond that, we have a report that proposes a move for between 50% and 100% of the advertising on TG4 in particular to be as Gaeilge. I will go through these amendments, bit by bit. Amendment No. 84 is the one from Cumann na Gaeilge.

Amendment No. 48 concerns setting a minimum percentage of the content of television or sound broadcasting to be as Gaeilge. Over the years, we have found that those who were meant, or promised, to ensure a certain percentage never achieved it. That includes the State broadcasters other than TG4 and Raidió na Gaeltachta. The proposal is that the commission would examine this issue, come back within a certain period of time and thereafter set five-year targets, if that is acceptable. It proposes that the commission would publish a report within a year, which could open a discussion about feasibility. Television and radio broadcasters operate under a licence. It is not an open licence. Because the State is granting the licence, it can set conditions. As I said earlier about another amendment, broadcasters accept those conditions. Those are the conditions on which they were granted the licence and they are meant to deliver on them.

Amendment No. 62 speaks in some ways to something Deputy Canney and others mentioned earlier. I have another amendment too. This amendment intends to encourage Irish traditional music by ensuring that a percentage of air time is reserved for it. The threshold is set quite low as the amendment would require at least 5% to be reserved for musical composition containing lyrics mostly in the Irish language by 2025, with that increasing to 10% by 2030. It is to ensure that the content being broadcast fulfils those criteria as a condition of a licence being granted. It would be a means of promoting Irish musicians and ensuring that they benefit.

The amendment also seeks to ensure that lyrics are not only in the English language. There is an element intended to ensure we have music from within the EU in order to diversify the content on radio stations. It would ensure that lyrical content is not only in English, as we have seen on some channels. In many cases, not only do the presenters speak English but the music they present is entirely in the English language. Many of our communities, therefore, do not experience a lot of the music one would hear on the Continent. On the Continent, members of the younger generation in particular switch between languages. There is a predominance of English among teenage and youthful audiences but there are fantastic musicians who cannot be heard on Irish radio.

Amendment No. 64 relates to a matter that is a bugbear for many who love and enjoy TG4. Their frustration is that they are listening and immersed in TG4 before all of a sudden, because of a need for commercially viable, advertising is, in some instances, fully as Béarla. That is fine for some people who can switch between languages but others find that frustrating and it takes them a while to refocus. There is a question as to whether an Irish-language broadcaster should be broadcasting anything in English. I raised that point when I met representatives of TG4 recently. They told me there would be a cost involved but not necessarily a cost on the television station. The cost would fall to those making the advertising. Having spoken to people within the advertising industry, they understand, given what is coming down the track in respect of the Official Languages Act, there will be an increase in funding for Irish-language advertising. They would consider that an incentive. This amendment is intended to ensure the incentive is more than just a few extra advertisements on TG4. It seeks to ensure that TG4 can demand or request of its advertisers that they produce advertisements in Irish. That can include voice-overs when the content is made initially and advertising with no words at all, which many of the clever advertisers are doing at the moment.

Once advertisers know this, it is a lot cheaper to do initially when they are putting an advertisement together rather than having to recast or dub over it. If they understood that this was a requirement under legislation, they would definitely refocus.