Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his reply. It appears that his management of the programme has been very successful. This is something one could have envisaged were one to examine the Minister's political career and his expertise in switchovers, and I had no doubt that he would succeed in this regard. It has also been significantly more successful than the efforts of the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Hogan, in respect of the household charge. I imagine that if he were to venture in the direction of Brussels, Deputy Rabbitte would be a shoo-in for that post.

Will the Minister comment on the fact that many of the Saorview-approved boxes are designed such that there is no facility for television viewers to watch one programme while recording another? It is deemed by me and others to be a remarkable failure of technology at this stage in 2012. It is remarkable that Saorview-approved boxes do not have the facility available in other products associated with the Sky network and so forth.

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