Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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I thank colleagues for their very heartfelt contributions today. Our officials present have taken copious notes on all the points raised. I have no doubt that they, along with myself, will relay them to the Minister, Deputy O'Donovan.

There are two colleagues who remain in the House. I take Deputy Boyd Barrett's point and his concerns on the 25% but it is important to acknowledge that a lot of that will go to independent Irish content creators too, and they are all creatives. I hear what the Deputy is saying. We are only on Second Stage of this Bill so hopefully there will be an opportunity to give the Deputy the reassurance that it will be used wisely and used in a way that helps our independent Irish creators flourish too. Not everybody wants to work in RTÉ. Deputy Boyd Barrett and I both know that being from the creative industries. It is not for everybody and there must be a funding source for those independent creators who want to work outside the bubble of RTÉ. We have to find a way to do that, to fund that and to find a way it can be done in a transparent way.

In respect of the geo-blocking raised by Deputy Ó Murchú, I concur with everything the Deputy has said.

Ruairí Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Would that be in general?

Verona Murphy (Wexford, Independent)
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Please, Deputy Ó Murchú.

Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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I have some notes here in relation to the piece on geo-blocking. There is an existing legislative obligation on RTÉ and TG4 to make their television and services free to air to the whole community of Ireland insofar that it is reasonably practical. However, cases can arise where public service broadcasters cannot broadcast certain content outside the State due to rights restrictions, noting that the rights to content are often provided on a geographic or territorial basis. There is further opportunity to engage with the Minister on this and I support Deputy Ó Murchú's views on that as a Border county colleague. I thank the officials who have sat here trying to feed information to me and, more importantly, who have been taking note of everything that is being raised and particularly the concerns. I have no doubt they will raise it with the Minister, Patrick O'Donovan.

I thank all the Deputies for their important contributions this afternoon. It is a little bit of déjà vu after the last term in the Dáil. I am hopeful for RTÉ's sake, because we know how important our public service broadcaster is given we live in a time of so much misinformation, with loud, algorithmic-driven outrage. It is so important the Irish public has objective reporting and not commentating, as Deputy Ward quite rightly said, with reporting on current affairs and reporting as is, so our general public have that. That is so important to our culture, our society and to democracy. I hope we are coming to a new dawn within RTÉ that everyone can have confidence around.

As has been raised by a number of contributors, those ideals are not limited to RTÉ and TG4. Our local, regional and national commercial newspapers and broadcasters also produce public interest journalism that holds power to account and makes innovative Irish programming available to the public. That is why this Bill will put in place a statutory framework that seeks to ensure the Irish public has access to high-quality, accessible public service content supplied by RTÉ and TG4. They will have a distinctive role and duties as public service media providers, and also to the wider Irish media sector.

The variety of the issues which have been raised on the floor highlight the breadth of the framework set out in the Bill. The Bill represents a key milestone in the evolution of the Broadcasting Act 2009 in terms of the regulation, governance and assessment of our public service media providers and the assessment and recognition of the role of the wider media sector in providing public service content to the public.

The Bill will provide Coimisiún na Meán, as independent regulator, with enhanced powers to ensure that public service media providers are transparent, independent and provide value for money, which is what we all want to see. The Bill enables Coimisiún na Meán to deal with the continuing changes in how we support and engage with public service media and public service content providers in Ireland.

The Bill has a critical EU law dimension as it will transpose provisions of the European Media Freedom Act. The Bill increases public service media’s independence, strengthens the independent regulator, and provides for objective assessments of funding needs and appraisal, as required by the European Media Freedom Act.

Finally, I express my deep thanks for the contributions today and I look forward to working with Deputies into the future.

Verona Murphy (Wexford, Independent)
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In accordance with Standing Order 85(2), the division is deferred until the next weekly division time.