Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I commend Deputy Dooley on introducing this motion. This is a very significant year for independent broadcasting in Ireland. It is the 30th anniversary of the awarding of the first licences and it is the year the Minister will have to get real about its future. We have had many engagements, promises and discussions, but this year the Minister and the Department have to get real about securing the future of the independent sector that has been so successful at national, regional, local and community level. It has been successful in giving local voices and local issues a stage they would not otherwise get; in profiling local sports, local initiatives and local achievements; and in being there when communities are challenged, such as during huge weather events. My own local station, Midwest Radio, broadcast through the night during the worst of the weather last year. In the event of local tragedies these broadcasters are on hand to support local communities. A large national organisation cannot do that. Local, regional and independent radio does that.

The Minister knows and has said himself that fake news is a threat. It is not just some sort of comedy invention. Deputy Dooley's proposals put flesh on an effort to defend the integrity of journalism locally, regionally and nationally. They represent a move to defend it with cash rather than with kind words, which will not pay any bills in an independent radio station. We have to look at the connection between communities and their radio stations. The listenership figures one sees around the country are testament to that in a very intense commercial world. We have to recognise that this connection costs money. It cannot pay for itself commercially. The Minister needs to come to the table with the kind of proposals that Deputy Dooley is putting forward, otherwise we will lose stations and lose that connection.

I also want to point out the success of community radio. Local community-based radio stations in towns like my home town in Ballina, in Erris, in Claremorris and in Castlebar bring local issues and local voices to the fore. That is the diversity Irish radio listeners have but that has been lost in many other countries around the world. We can stand up for that diversity. We can protect it by putting cash on the table from resources that are already there, or we can give it false promises and a pat on the back and see it disappear. I call on the Minister not to let it disappear on his watch.

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