Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

Like others, I want to speak on the importance of public service broadcasting and about media that measures the public benefit, not simply the economic cost. In commercial media we see shock, anger and division often being used to gather and hold audiences. These audiences are then trussed up and sold on to advertisers. The only reason the audiences are pulled in is to simply sell them on to advertisers and the public benefit is lost. We have seen the rot that can cause to our society. We have also seen the importance of public service broadcasting in terms of independent examination. I welcome the Minister's root and branch review because that is exactly what public service broadcasting should be doing every day. It is what good journalism does in here and outside every day. It is fair to say that the staff of RTÉ feel betrayed. We have heard what the unions had to say. Other Deputies have spoken about the two-tier system, where those at the top are looked after but nobody else is.

The public feels betrayed. The taxpayer and the licence payer is deeply betrayed. One thing that needs to come from this review and from RTÉ in general, is to remember that it is a public service and that it must return to that public service. If that requires radical change, then let us have it. Let us look at the funding model and ask how much has the public service model been corrupted by the advertising that RTÉ tries to sell. How much of the public service model has been corrupted by the wild salaries? Surely we should be looking at pay caps or tying the salaries for all to the public sector pay scales in order that everyone there is treated fairly. These are fundamental things to consider.

We also need to look at what the public service broadcaster does. When we look at other jurisdictions, we see public service broadcasters do so much more than simply run television stations. They do much more in terms of using their websites and archives and in reaching out to under-served communities and promoting local culture and creativity. RTÉ is not doing anywhere near enough of this. Perhaps if it spent more time trying to do that instead of arranging curious contracts and barter accounts, it would be doing a damn sight better.

What needs to come out of the review is a renewal of the public service ethos. One of the aspects of this is the archive. I remind the Minister of the legislation I have brought before the House regarding the opening of the archive.

I made the point that RTÉ had come cap in hand to this place time and time again looking for us to support it because of its public service remit. It is important that we ask RTÉ what it is doing for that public service remit. We have seen in recent weeks that it has done nothing, or certainly very little. In fact, it is working against the public service. We must demand more of RTÉ. I offer my Bill as one way to do that, but I think in many ways we need to demand more of it. We must look at how RTÉ treats its staff and look at pay caps. All these things are essential for RTÉ to return to public service broadcasting, and to news and media that is about public benefit and not simply measured in economic costs.

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