Malcolm Byrne (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will be moving amendment No. 49 in due course, which is part of this group, but I wish to comment on the previous remarks. I agree in principle with some of the points that are being made. Senator Ruane said that the figures are a little arbitrary but what is important is that there are figures there. The effect of the amendments would be to remove any limits. On gifts, for example, if a provider offered one tea or coffee, bought one a drink or invited one to a particular event, that could be classified as a gift and that may cause a difficulty. There must be some kind of threshold unless we are moving to an Olympics-style situation whereby somebody cannot even accept a cup of tea. I do not think that the figures are unreasonable but I understand the point the Senators are making.

The amendment that Senator Cassells and I have tabled is more of a point for discussion really. The assumption is that having an interest in one of these providers is purely based around having a financial interest, whereas in terms of how media operate at the moment, somebody can be a media influencer but may not necessarily have shares in the platform. He or she would certainly have an interest in how that platform is regulated. If an individual has a significant number of followers on a social media platform, he or she is going to take an interest in the manner in which that platform is going to be regulated.

If, for instance, somebody is appointed as a commissioner and he or she is a significant social media influencer and has a range of experiences, decisions could be made by the commission that could impact on the expansion of that person's influence using his or her own social media channels. I accept that some of that may be around the development of codes of behaviour for commissioners by the new commission but we need to look at this in terms that are broader than just financial in the context of somebody's interest in particular platforms.

I appreciate the point that in this amendment the figure we include is arbitrary, that of 20,000 followers or subscribers, but if one is operating a YouTube channel with 20,000 subscribers and the commission is making decisions around the regulation of YouTube, one is going to have an interest in that, even though one may not have shares in YouTube. We have included this amendment primarily for debate purposes. When we look at media providers, we need to think about interests more broadly than simply having financial shares in a company. These are very different platforms. The media commission will look to regulate the metaverse in the future, for example. If people have interests in the sense that they have a number of very popular avatars that are operating within the metaverse and if a decision is going to be made that may have an impact, that is a cause for concern. We must think about how we can broaden the definition of interest beyond purely having a direct financial interest or share in a company.