Ms Louise Cornally:

On section 481 supports leaving the country and subsidising foreign companies. It gets thrown out there quite a lot. At the core of this, we have to remember that section 481 is in place to support and build the industry and create talent. Without international players coming to Ireland, we would not have that ability. The EU Commission recognises that Europe needs subsidies and the countries need to support local producers in order to attract production which allows them build on the indigenous industry.

We are competing with very strong US-based production entities. We cannot lose sight of the fact that we must remain competitive in order to maintain the industry which is at the heart of all of this. If we did not have section 481, essentially, we would not have an industry. It is very important to make that point, alongside the question of section 481 subsidising foreign productions because when a producer is looking at where he or she is going to produce animation, a live action film or a TV series, he or she will look at tax credits that are currently available right across the globe. If we did not have the tax credit, essentially, we would not have an industry here. That is the first point about the international studios either shooting or producing animation here.

In terms of producing IP, and the indigenous companies producing their own content and retaining some rights, it is extremely challenging to do that whether it is animation or live action. If one is going to finance your own production, the budget can range from €1.5 million right up to €15 million or €16 million - that would be spent locally - in order to finance it one might go to international broadcasters to get licence fees - there are multiple ways of financing it - but there would always be a gap in the production. There is simply no way an Irish company could produce that content without having section 481 in place, so it does also come back to the indigenous industry here in that regard. Despite the fact that there are international broadcasters attached to it, the point I want to make is that they are not going to fully finance the full cost of the production via a licence agreement.