Dominic Hannigan (Meath East, Labour)
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To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources his plans to make Saorview channels available on FreeSat;; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [40729/12]

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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In the UK, the public service channels for example BBC and Channel 4, are obliged to provide their channels throughout the UK freely over a digital platform. They have chosen to do this in two ways – using both a digital terrestrial network and also using satellite. Their satellite service, Freesat, is intended to provide for reception to the UK only but also covers Ireland through overspill.

In order to overcome copyright issues which are associated with broadcasting, the UK channels must purchase the rights to show their acquired content in Ireland as well as the UK. The copyright costs are proportional to TV viewer numbers so the additional cost for acquiring the rights to broadcast in Ireland is small. As an alternative approach, the UK could choose to encrypt the satellite service so that it could not be received in Ireland or elsewhere.

For the Irish channels to be freely available on the same satellite as the UK channels, the issue of copyright also arises. Irish stations would need to acquire copyright throughout the footprint area of the satellite, in the UK as well as Ireland, or to provide an encrypted service. RTÉ has informed us that both options are prohibitively expensive and that they have no plans to seek to place Saorview channels on Freesat.

In Ireland RTÉ has chosen to build its free to air digital network over two platforms - over a digital terrestrial network (SAORVIEW) and over satellite (SAORSAT). SAORVIEW is available to 98% of the population whilst SAORSAT has 100% coverage, covering only Ireland.

RTÉ has informed us that with SAORSAT it is possible to pick up the UK Freesat TV channels as well as the Irish TV channels by using a second Low Noise Block Down converter Feedhorn (LNBF) which is correctly aligned. SAORSAT therefore provides a mechanism whereby both Saorview and Freesat TV channels can be received.

Further information on SAORSAT is available at: .