Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair and committee for the warm welcome. Hopefully, as the questions begin that welcome will stay warm. I thank the committee for the invitation to appear before them today in relation to my Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill 2023.

My Bill is a simple one; its goal is to open RTÉ’s video and audio archive to the Irish people to whom it really belongs. RTÉ was, until the 1990s, Ireland’s only domestic TV channel. Since its inception and until that point it essentially built up what is a huge national video and audio archive. It is a rich social history of who we are as a nation, where we have come from and where we are going in the future. Countries such as the United Kingdom and Switzerland have recognised this and have made their equivalent archives available to their citizens. My fundamental belief is we should be doing the same. To its credit, RTÉ is deeply aware of the importance of the archive and the responsibility that comes with this. Certain credit and thanks is due to it for the protection of that archive up until this point. The purpose of this Bill is not to undermine that but to simply expand the work that is being done.

In the Bill, I have taken the responsibilities which apply to the director of the National Archives under the National Archives Act 2003 and applied those to the director general. This would “ensure the publication of archives, finding aids and other material relating to archives". It is important to note I have also specified this would be “freely available for personal research and academic use in line with the greater public interest". There is no commercial impact on RTÉ in this Bill. The aim of the Bill is to have a similar impact on TG4 in its archiving remit.

The goal of this Bill is to formalise this process and make it more streamlined. Currently, the process is quite opaque and ad hoc. RTÉ is doing an excellent job and currently provides limited public access to its archives. Individuals can contact RTÉ via email and it will, depending on the query, offer availability to come on-site and view specific material. External researchers, however, have no access to the internal RTÉ finding aids and can only access what is given to them. The fact that this process exists, whilst cumbersome, is important. Many researchers have come forward since my Bill was initially published to voice their frustration at the challenging nature of the process and how difficult it can be in practice to get access. I have also been contacted by people in the archiving and academic sphere offering their support for my Bill, including several former employees of RTÉ itself. The need for the Bill is clear and the support among the people in the archiving and academic communities is there.

RTÉ and the Department understandably may raise issues around copyright and royalty payments that will arise from this Bill. These issues are a red herring and should not impede the progression of this Bill. These are issue that all archives face and they can be managed by managing the archive well and having sufficient archivists in place who can manage records effectively. Indeed, the issues around royalties and copyright are issues those responsible for the RTÉ archives already deal with and they deal with them very well. They provide that limited access and they already address these issues and deal with them effectively. They deal with these at the same time as RTÉ's vast digitisation process and again, that needs to be acknowledged. The aim of this Bill is to streamline that process and make it clearer and less ad hoc.

I visited the RTÉ archives and it is really a treasure trove and the passion and expertise of the staff members who work there is obvious and clear from the moment you step in. I have seen the fantastic ongoing digitisation scheme that will preserve this archive well into the future. The question then arises as to for whom is it being preserved. Is it for internal RTÉ use and the odd researcher that gains access or should it be preserved as that rich social history for the Irish people? If it is that last one, we need to find ways to streamline the process and make it more concrete.

When I wrote this Bill, I felt it was a chance to underline the public service of RTÉ. Since then, we have seen issues and challenges overcome RTÉ. We have to be honest and say to a certain degree, they have lost the public trust. By backing this Bill, both RTÉ and the members of this committee can play a role in the rebuilding that public service and trust. I thank Adam Ladd in my office who was the real engine behind this Bill in terms of its drafting and genesis. As we would not be here were it not for his work, I thank him for that.