John Whelan (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House. This is a timely debate and it is important that we are having it in a public space in order that we can tease out these issues. I would like to broaden the discussion. It is listed on the schedule as broadcasting, communications and media. When we talk about this issue we tend to boil it down to a discussion about RTE and the television licence fee and we tend to get sucked into that space.

In the first instance, I would like to say that I would not be in favour of abolishing the television licence fee. I would have to stoutly disagree with my esteemed colleague because I think that would be tantamount to not only pulling the plug on RTE but to pulling the plug on public service broadcasting and everything that goes with that and everything that we expect to go with that. This is not an issue about RTE or the television licence fee. For me, it is about standards, public service broadcasting, diversity of ownership and content, and the quality, credibility and independence of the content. That would be a very dangerous road to do down.

It is through no fault on the Minister's part but successive Governments have failed down the decades to address the thorny and complex issue of media ownership and control. As a result, the media mergers and the media competition legislation that we ultimately introduced last year was a classic example of closing the stable door after the horse had well and truly bolted. It is immaterial to me who owns the commercial media, in broadcasting or in print in this country. It is immaterial to me whether it is Johnston, Mooney and-or O'Brien or any other O'Brien. What is important for me has never been what gets into print or into broadcasting but what does not get there. It is what is prevented for whatever reason that is important.

Very often some of the best programming can take months, if not a year or more, to research and to finally get to print or to get to broadcasting. If we were only to assign commercial criteria, we would not be getting the standard of programme, to be fair to RTE and it is easy to beat it up, and I agree with some of the comments my colleagues have made. RTE is in place in one part to hold the public bodies of this country to account, certainly to hold the Government of the day, politicians and public figures to account but, by the same standard, it should not be afraid to have the mirror of accountability and transparency put up against its organisation and operation. It is also a public body but sometimes it bristles when we dare to ask a question or to probe into its activities and standards, and that is unfortunate.

The commercial stations provide a very valid public service broadcasting remit throughout the country. We have all become fond of our local stations. As I drive through the country, I like tuning into the local stations to hear what is going on in that community and get a flavour of what is happening in that area. We have very good stations in my community where we have Midlands 103 and in Kildare we have KFM. As Senator Mooney mentioned, we have our own Gay Byrnes, Pat Kennys and Seán O'Rourkes in Will Faulkner and Shane Beatty who do tremendous work for the community by holding the public system and the State to account on a daily basis, and people tune in and enjoy that.

It is not a question of our beating up RTE to help the other local stations. The two prospects of supporting RTE in its remit and helping local stations are not mutually exclusive and we should not see them as being at opposite ends of the spectrum. However, I would like to add a note of caution. I come from a background of having had a legacy of 30 years working in the regional press, the local newspapers, which also provide a very strong local function within their local communities, local parishes and across the different counties. It would be unfair on them in a competitive and commercial context to be put at an unfair disadvantage if we were, for argument sake, to subsidise or support commercial radio stations at the expense of small local newspapers which are also struggling in the current climate of flux, change and challenge that the media sector is going through. It is quite a convulsion.

The Minister has been around as long as I am and he will remember the famous song, "Video Killed the Radio Star". It seemed like that at the time but video has gone and the radio has survived and is prospering. We do not know how this is going to pan out or where it will end up, but we are entering into a new era. It would be wrong to pull the plug on RTE, to try to undermine it. Certainly it should be challenged and expected to present and produce programming of the highest standards in current affairs, news, the arts, agriculture, in all the spectrum that we expect from a strong State public service broadcaster, but to say that it could do that and at the same time abolish the licence fee outright would not be compatible or sustainable. That would be a dangerous place to venture and, certainly, it is not a view I would support. While it is easy to beat up RTE and some of its precious presenters, we have to look beyond and behind that and see on the day-to-day basis the quality programming we get on television and on radio and the information provided to the public in an independent fashion, regardless of who is in government or who is the Minister. Certainly, RTE puts it up to the Government of the day and that is a good thing. It does so across a whole range of public bodies and public services that need to be held to account.RTE cannot have its bread buttered on both sides - and with jam - through both the licence fee and commercial revenues, and then not fulfil its public service remit. The Minister should instruct, or at least advise, RTE management that it is high time they provided space on the Saorview band to broadcast the Oireachtas TV channel. Under the provisions of the Broadcasting Act 2009, sections 125 and 126, RTE is obliged to do so. It is getting millions in what my colleague, Senator Mulcahy, refers to as a subsidy and yet it refuses to broadcast Oireachtas TV. It wants another €1 million from the Exchequer, the Government or the taxpayer before it will agree to do so. RTE cannot have it both ways. The Ceann Comhairle and the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission have engaged exhaustively with RTE and ComReg for four years now. I am of the view that the station has failed to live up to its public service broadcasting remit. There is a provision in the Act for the Minister to advise and direct RTE to do so.

Ironically, RTE went to the courts to seek permission to broadcast elements of debates in the Dáil. Those elements were already being broadcast constantly on the Oireachtas TV channel via the Oireachtas website, Sky, UPC and Eircom. While those three commercial channels broadcast Oireachtas TV, the State broadcaster, whose duty and responsibility it is to do so, continues to dodge the issue and refuses to broadcast it. It is time RTE lived up to its status as the State broadcaster. It must accede to our request and, if it does not, some intervention from the Minister will be timely.