David Norris (Independent)

What the Minister said about the film channel is very interesting and exciting. On the basis of my own experience, the Chinese, with whom I am quite familiar because Chinatown is at the bottom of my street which is Parnell Street, already get Chinese films so I do not think 5,000 Chinese people will watch whatever RTE or anyone else can dredge up because they are already running. I frequently see them in the little restaurants.

The Minister addressed the earlier point in a very interesting way. The BBC used to be the broadcasting equivalent of the Garda Síochána. It was unarmed and had the proud boast that it did not have advertisements at all but now it does. The BBC has advertisements on its international service which are mainly for banks and big institutions like that so advertising has penetrated there.

What we were talking about, as I understand my brief, was a situation which would not be a particularly regular one but which might occur from time to time. Supposing there was a four-minute advertising slot, it would run over on the hour, for reasons Senators O'Reilly and Mullen and I have already suggested. In other words, if, because of a very important interview on a news programme, one started the advertisement sequence at 9.58 p.m. instead of 9.56 p.m., there would be no technical infringement by leaking over into the next hour.

How will this be policed? Will there be a monitoring service? In many ways, I would like to think there would be. I am a great fan of RTE but I do not think they listen to themselves. Sometimes they go off the air, one gets bleed from another studio, music pops in unexpectedly, one hears conversations between presenters and so forth. It seems that nobody in RTE is actually listening and I would like the Minister to explain, in order to make sure this is efficient, if there will be an agency monitoring broadcasts. How will we be able to tell if the advertisements go over time or are broadcast at an inappropriate time?

Such monitoring seems to be a useful option and perhaps could operate like the telephone-based home security services. Companies offering such services send the gardaí to one's home if one's alarm is activated but if they send them out on a false alarm more than three times in six months they cancel one's cover. That is an option which could be examined. Let us imagine a would-be margin of appreciation whereby a radio station that had a current affairs obligation allowed occasional leaks of advertisements from one hour to another. If there was somebody monitoring the broadcasts, we would know if such leakages were on the cusp of the hour or not and a system of three, six or eight strikes and the station is out could apply. I ask the Minister to explain how he will know if there are infringements.