Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I was reading RTÉ's vision statement earlier. It states:

RTÉ's vision is to champion Irish culture by captivating audiences with trusted, engaging and challenging content; celebrating our country's rich diversity; and cultivating Ireland's talent.

There are a number of parts of that statement that I want to focus on that situate themselves within the context of the current crisis in which RTÉ finds itself. I will focus specifically on those relating to the notion of trust and the concept of talent. All of these issues have been dealt with in the Oireachtas committees in recent days. We have seen them in the vast and growing array of media reports which have been circulating, some of course which RTÉ itself has been reporting on.

I want to be very clear here: this is in no way an attack on the ordinary workers within RTÉ, whom we have seen are very angry because many of them have felt very badly treated in recent years. Neither are we against the idea of having a public State broadcaster. To me, that is an extremely important concept that we need. The idea of trust is very important. What we saw in a recent poll is that 70% of people felt trust could not be restored. Since I have come in here, we have seen scandal after scandal that has repeatedly caused issues for people and for the public's trust in public life. Those scandals really do have an impact on that.

Then we have the concept of talent. There is nearly a perception that only certain people are talented; that the ordinary workers in RTÉ, who put on show after show and do all the work behind the scenes and in front of the cameras; do not have that same level of talent; and that certain people should get paid huge amounts - vast sums of money - while ordinary workers who put the show on the road week in, week out get paid very little or are on very obscure and difficult contracts.

Tá easpa muiníne ag an bpobal as RTÉ mar gheall ar an méid atá tarlaithe. Feicimid an bealach ina bhfuil RTÉ ag déileáil lena gnáthfhoireann. Feicimid freisin an bealach a chaitheann sé leo siúd a labhraíonn agus a oibríonn i nGaeilge i gcomparáid leo siúd a labhraíonn agus a oibríonn i mBéarla ó thaobh pá de. Caithfear stop a chur leis seo.

See this speech in context