Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Ceann Comhairle and let me also, Martin, be associated with the words of the Ceann Comhairle. I wish you all the best in your retirement and thank you, on behalf of Sinn Féin, for all the assistance you gave us and the whole team in the Oireachtas throughout the 22 years. We really appreciate that.

Yesterday, the public had a case of déjà vu, with the chair of the RTÉ board telling the Oireachtas media committee that the national broadcaster is considering paying out €400,000 to an unnamed individual. The chair of RTÉ's board said he could not name the person or say whether the person had appeared before the Oireachtas committee previously to deal with the crisis at the national broadcaster.

This comes only a few months after the Minister, Deputy Catherine Martin , said confidentiality agreements should be avoided and threatened a pay cap in RTÉ's exit packages, so I am sure the Minister will agree this will not go down well with the public. We thought these days were over and I ask the Minister what the Government will do about this. Is it also not time to implement the recommendation made by the Government's independent Future of Media Commission which called for the abolition of the licence fee or maybe the Minister will elaborate to the Dáil as to whether he has been in discussions with Revenue to bring in a new charge that will apply to all households?

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