Mr. Adam Larragy:

The major change will be that the audience council will be statutorily independent. The effect of that will be that it will include no members of staff or board members of RTÉ or TG4, or members of staff of Coimisiún na Meán. At the moment, a member of the board of either RTÉ or TG4 would be a member. In addition, the council will be selected by a selection panel that will be appointed by Coimisiún na Meán. That is reinforcing independence by putting in place an independent selection framework.

At the moment, the audience council presents an annual report. Provision has been made for the annual report to be laid before the Oireachtas, which, you could say, increases the seriousness of the report. The audience council will also have the power to make a special report on any matter related to the public service obligations of RTÉ or TG4. That allows the audience council to set out in a special report anything that comes to its attention during the year. RTÉ or TG4 would have to respond to that special report within four weeks. That is to cover anything that might come up during the year which the audience council would like to address.