Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair. I appreciate it as unfortunately, I am not a member of the committee. I thank everyone for their contributions. I did not hear everybody but I got the general gist and I have read through bits of the submissions.

One word that has been repeated here is “certainty” and the need for certainty. I would certainly appreciate that sentiment. Something that came across very strongly at the film industry stakeholder forum was that need for certainty. I am concerned - some of those here may be familiar with my concerns - that the whole industry from just about top to bottom is characterised by uncertainty and a lack of security about what is going to happen in the future, particularly for those who are going to work in it. I would say that the predominant characteristic faced by everybody from performers to crew is the complete lack of certainty. I am worried that some in the sector make a virtue of a necessity when it comes to uncertainty and I believe that needs to change. I would like to see a lot more money going into film. I think we are underspending in arts and we are generally way below the European average. The Government has a big responsibility to provide that certainty, whether it is in RTÉ, the film industry or a whole range of other areas of cultural and artistic pursuit. If we are going to convince anyone to do that, certainty must be provided as a quid pro quo. Ms Geraghty and Mr. Hickey will know that I do not think that is what is happening with some of the producers. I would like to ask straight whether they are up for the quid pro quo on this.

I heard Ms Breathnach – I totally agreed with her - talking about people getting trained, coming out of college and then having a viable career, but what does that mean? To my mind, having a viable career would mean that if someone goes into film production - the State is putting quite a lot of money into it - he or she will have some security from production to production that he or she will be employed and have rights to be re-employed. However, some parts of the film industry - I have to be honest and say I am thinking of SPI in particular - seem to make a virtue of trying to deny people those accumulated rights of service. The animation industry does not seem to do that. People seem to have jobs in the animation industry. People who get section 481 give them a certain certainty. Other film producers go in and out, day in, day out to the Workplace Relations Commission and say “I am not your employer".