Mr. Rory Coveney:

On the issue of funding, Deputies are Senators are probably sick of hearing RTÉ speak about the broken licence fee system, so I will not talk about it today, except to say it is the subject of a substantial review in relation to the Future of Media Commission. It is clear the system is losing huge amounts of money each year and as such the current model is neither fair on the people who pay the fee nor adequate in terms of the amount of money it generates to support the level of investment in content all of us need and, I would wager, the country needs.

On the reform mechanisms, there are many examples being considered by the commission and on which it has taken submissions from everyone here and many more people besides on what the future models might be. We put our best foot forward. We think a household based media charge collected by the Revenue Commissioners is, probably, the most efficient and simplest way to reform the current system. Others have different views on that, but I think it is sensible.

On the issue of whether a content levy or licence fee reform is best, we are in the most competitive media market in the world. RTÉ, TG4 and Virgin Media television compete with the best resourced TV channels and on-demand platforms anywhere on the planet in the English language. There is a notion that it is just about fixing the licence fee and everything will be fine. A range of measures will be needed to sustain the level of investment in Irish content, Irish storytelling and Irish journalism that public representatives want to see but also the public want to see. We survey the public all the time on what they want RTÉ to do. It is never that they want less; they want us to do more and to do more better. It is not about either or any of the measures, it is a collective of measures that seek to balance a range of different things.