Kevin Humphreys (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House. He has a very wide-ranging and challenging brief. I wish him the very best in that.

I have no great problem with the sale of land at Montrose but we need a whole-of-government approach to housing and housing in the capital city. One major developer's proposal, Project Montrose, is to put 500 apartments on the site. In many ways, this is within the scope of the development plan. Again, I have no great problem with it but I suggest to the Minister that he take a quick look at Poolbeg west or the old Irish Glass Bottle site, where the receivers have agreed to a proportion of social and affordable housing, including for rental, of up to 25%. I ask the Minister for a whole-of-government approach to the shortage of housing in the city and to consider a condition of sale stipulating that up to 30% of housing in the sale be social and affordable, including for rental. Everybody knows Donnybrook is one of the very wealthy areas but it also has Home Villas and Beech Hill, which were local authority housing. I very much urge the Minister to act on this.

I am a great admirer of RTE and that is why I try to hold it to account in this House. The director general got off to a very bad start when she was before the committee and failed to mention the closure of children's television. She did not even inform the group of unions within RTE, although it had been agreed with RTE. One can get over a bad start. One must hold RTE to account in this House without fear. Some Members raised the point with me today that they are a little fearful about holding RTE to account.

One must hold RTE to account in regard to its editorial coverage of the news. In early April, RTE covered semi-State companies and their bonuses. I ask the Minister to examine the freedom of information questions I put to RTE about its performance-related employment. In the vast majority of the questions I asked, there was a ruling against me. I have appealed. RTE has covered other semi-State companies on the same issue in a very derogatory way so I actually gave it a taste of its own medicine, to a degree. Unfortunately, I did not get the answers.

Let me address a recent occurrence concerning social media. RTE has a legal obligation regarding fairness. RTE issued social media guidelines in 2013. This probably followed on from what happened to Senator Norris during the presidential election campaign. The guidelines were reissued and updated in 2015. I find it extremely unacceptable and disappointing that the head of news would actually tweet on the future leader of Fine Gael. It is of no account to me or Senator Norris but it certainly relates to whoever will be the next Taoiseach. For the life of me, I cannot understand why the director general or chairman of the RTE board has not given some comfort in regard to the standards. I can understand that what occurred was a mistake and that the information was taken down quickly. We have to be confident, however, because RTE has a very important place in our society. It is the dominant news agency in this country. When the head of news tweets in such a manner – I admit it was taken down quickly – the Minister must put questions to the chairman of the RTE board and the director general. They must make it very clear that they will cover political discussion in society in a fair and impartial way, as RTE is legally obliged to do. I would be very interested in hearing the Minister's response on this issue, which has arisen only in recent days.