Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 18 June 2025
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Media, Communications, Culture and Sport
General Scheme of the Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill: Discussion (Resumed)
2:00 am
Ms Áine Ní Chaoindealbháin:
We have very robust editorial policy and procedures in place to make sure we are fair and balanced in all of our output. This is reflected on air in what we see on our screens and behind the scenes. With regard to the misinformation and getting to an audience, we have had year-on-year growth of 12% in our news.
However, we are aware that certain demographics do not watch news in a traditional sense so we have to be careful to ensure we are reaching that audience. We have taken a different approach from a digital perspective to access people on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. We have seen significant growth in that. We have spent time on it. I do not want to talk to Gavan Reilly because he is in the room but a very good example of clarity on what we do on the electoral procedure was the Smarties video, which reached 3.8 million views and had 83,000 interactions. That was about taking away any lack of clarity that people may have around voting and the electoral process. We have policies in place and we make sure that we actively review them on a continual basis.