Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

What TG4 is looking for is not unreasonable in this day and age. The organisation had that at one stage and I do not know why it lost it. I presume it was connected to the collapse in the economy, but I am not sure. It is not an unreasonable ask and it is one we will work through with TG4 over the next while. I do not see why it should not be able to produce its own news. Obviously, there will be cost implications and how we meet those will be another day’s work. I watch TG4 quite a lot. It has been transformative in terms of sport. It is broadcasting sports that no one would touch until recently and now everybody wants them. Everybody wants the national hurling league, the football league and the club championships because they realise the audience TG4 has for them. They want to try to poach them off TG4. They could not look after what they had themselves and now they want to take what TG4 has. It does a great job. It has my full support.