Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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276. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she will address a matter (details supplied) regarding television licence revenue; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [5982/22]

Catherine Martin (Dublin Rathdown, Green Party)
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Total Television Licence Fee Receipts comprise monies from TV licence sales and exchequer funding from the Department of Social Protection for the operation of the free TV licence Scheme.

The level of evasion is calculated annually and is arrived at through the collation of a number of diverse sources, including housing data from the Census, CSO housing data for new builds and business data from the Revenue Commissioner’s Annual Report. The 2020 level of evasion is estimated to be 15.2% which has increased from 12.6% in 2019. Every effort is made by An Post to bring evaders into the licensed pool and a considerable amount of time and resources are spent in dealing with this issue. It is important to note that in line with public health guidelines, TV Licence Inspections were suspended for periods in both 2020 and 2021. In the period from the 13^thMarch to end 2020, TV Licence Inspectors could only operate as normal for 2 months, and operated on a non-contact basis for 3 and a half months. There was no activity for the first 4 months of 2021 and non-contact inspections resumed on 10^thMay, with full inspections resuming from 14^thJune.

The total receipts and the evasion rate from 2011-2021 are provided in the table below.