Mr. Pat Kiely:

I have spoken to Ms Forbes directly about some of her ideas. I talked about what we have already done with Sky and Netflix, and Dee and some of her team are aware. We have already started discussions and I am looking forward to RTE working with us on some of these plans.

One example of that is the diaspora channel, which has been looked at previously. Now we have a real opportunity, particularly with Virgin Media as owners of TV3. Virgin Media can open up 4 million homes in the UK overnight through its network in the UK and there is a great opportunity. Previous manifestations were, as is previous on this topic, RTE-focused. Now there is an opportunity to bring RTE's content and TV3's content together.

That brings me to the point that I wanted to make. The Deputy asked what the committee could do for us. The ask on our part is allow us to compete. The committee has seen what happens when TV3 is asked to compete - it drives efficiencies.

The other ask is recognise us as a public service broadcaster. We had to ask to be included in a number of debates over the past number of years. We are not viewed as a public service broadcaster and therefore we ourselves have to ask. I believe we need to earn the right to be at that table but what I presented today is, hopefully, evidence that we are putting our money where our mouth is. If we want to play a part and share rights with RTE we need to demonstrate, which we have been, particularly more recently, that the viewer will be as well served with content, such as sport, news and current affairs, being broadcast on TV3 as on RTE.