Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister might be able to explain a technical point. I am trying to figure out why the opportunity was not taken to change the reference to the Irish Film Board to Fís Éireann, or Screen Ireland. It is strange when that is its name as set out in legislation and we are dealing here with an Irish Film Board change. There may be some technicality I have overlooked. I will not delay much as I have asked some of my questions already.

Screen Ireland provided funding of €281.66 million for the Irish film sector in 2017. How much of that went to training or is there any separation out of that part of the funding spent on training? That is one of the key issues. We are trying to ensure that there are proper training and facilities but also that trainees will have proper contracts at the end of the process. I have heard no one argue against the intent of the Bill or the changes to section 481. All I have heard is Members seeking to ensure that any employment in this industry is quality employment. If we have quality employment, we get a return on our investment. Those who work in the industry would then have proper terms and conditions and benefits and it would improve things. We are not trying to restrict or hamper small Irish companies availing of up to €500 million in grant aid from Screen Ireland. I have been informed that it should be easy to capture some of the abuse by way of a proper interrogation of the budgets submitted to Fís Éireann. It ought to be possible to identify whether a film's budget is realistic. While we know some films run over schedule, a film should generally take a certain length of time to make and one should be able to identify the number of people employed on it. From that information, it should be possible to work out if they have been paid the proper rates of compensation and the other standard contributions we expect in every other industry. One should be able to determine whether it is a company designed to make a profit for the owners first and foremost rather than to look after the key workers on the film in question.

A number of recommendations were made by the Joint Committee on Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. I will not go through all of them. Some of what I was trying to do involved allowing the Minister to try capture some of those by means of regulations, reports or one of the proposals in the three amendments. I hoped one of those would be acceptable to the Minister to ensure that there is an ongoing understanding that we are not willing to accept a continuing failure by an industry which has been grant-aided and subsidised by tax relief to address the problems which have been exposed. Some of those problems were set out in the report. There may be merit in the Minister reconsidering and reverting to the House with a new Bill to address other small housekeeping aspects of the film industry, including its tax treatment, in the near future. At least then, we could get properly to grips with the future of the film industry in Ireland, whether at the point of pre-legislative scrutiny or on Committee Stage.

The industry is supposed to support the employment of nearly 17,000 people but I am informed that the latter is a huge exaggeration and that the number of persons employed in the industry is far lower. Within that 17,000, I understand some people have been counted twice if not three times due to their employment across a number of film or television productions within a 12-month period.

It is a pity the amendments were ruled out of order. If they had been accepted, we might have had a more specific and structured debate.

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