The national culture stipulation in section 17 is phrased in general terms because a more precise definition might have been difficult to formulate. Let us think about it for a moment. Ireland is a small nation, as has often been said, beset on both sides by rather powerful Anglo-Saxon cultures, all the greater now because of the spread of communications systems, all the greater now because their effect was not as great in the earlier years of this century and the later years of the past century when the resurgence of the national movement and the Irish revival were in full spate.
One could dwell at some length on the reasons why the foundation of this State has led, to some extent, to a certain disappointment. The great movements of the previous 50 years had ended in a rather inglorious civil war. Perhaps the great mistake was that politics and culture had become too closely allied before, so that those who were able—like, for example, Standish O'Grady —to give full cultural allegiance to the Irish nation may have been alienated by the then too close alliance with politics.
I want to suggest to the House that we must be careful in this context not to view Irish culture in too narrow a perspective. It is not the narrow exclusive thing which some people suggest. It includes all those elements which go to form the Irish way of looking at life. It includes an appreciation of the Irish language, of its inheritance, of Irish history and traditions and a consciousness of being part of a distinct nation moulded by various influences, a stream in which the Gaelic, Anglo-Irish and Scots Gaelic elements have mixed, each adding its own enrichment to the whole. In passing, one could offer the comment that a lot of the potential divisiveness seen in the North of Ireland is less of a religious thing and perhaps more of a cultural one.
The RTE contribution to the restoring of the Irish language is open to criticism from time to time from those who would demand that more programmes in Irish than perhaps would gain present acceptance from the viewers be shown. I shall content myself with saying that the use of the language on television benefits from the conferral of status which any subject depicted on the medium receives from its very appearance. If I might offer a criticism of Irish language programmes, it is that one should always be careful to remember the statutory injunction in the Act that in presenting programmes in Irish, the relevant personnel remember section 18 which says that the presentation of matters should be balanced and no expression of the authority's own view should be apparent.
In this regard I should like to pay a tribute to the Irish language programmes we have seen and to say that I think the House will agree that the language has received an increase in status as a result of the showing of various subjects through the medium of Irish on the television screen. The national culture stipulation of section 17 is also covered by the Gaeltacht radio service, but as I mentioned this on the last day, there is no point in going back over what I said then.
It is in the field of cultivating a national identity that the station can be a potent force. Let us not minimise the difficulties confronting us. Our identity as a nation is in some danger of being submerged in an insipid mid-Atlantic mediocrity by the increasing emphasis on urbanisation and commercialism. I am not suggesting that every modern influence is bad. It is a sign of a vital living organism if a nation is able to assimilate from outside itself and form afresh by a force which one would characterise as the genius of the race. Television in my view is the greatest instrument we have in the preservation and enhancement of our distinctive characteristics as a separate Irish nation.
Speaking of a living vital organism leads me to the next point, that national culture is not a static thing. It is not a fossilised thing of the past. It embraces all the aspects of our Irish society in this island and to the aspects more usually considered such as literature, art and so on, I would add the living institutions of the State, legislative, juridicial, governmental, administrative, educational, political and ecclesiastical, and I think it is noteworthy that in an age in which democratic Government has come under attack and in which the media have been used in some parts of the world to undermine the national culture, RTE with some aberrations has done its part.
The second programming constraint which I mentioned is the financial situation. It is a fact that imported programmes are cheaper to show than home-produced material and therefore, when a station finds the going hard, it will tend to lessen the proportion of home-produced material shown. I have already mentioned in another context the tendency of imported material to increase as the financial situation worsens. Again the type of home-produced material varies in cost, with categories such as drama and documentaries which are costly to produce, suffering as compared with the more easily produced studio discussions which by comparison are relatively cheap.
The result has been that programmes dealing, for example, with literature, which require visualisation to be meaningful in television terms, and documentary film of many aspects of Irish life have had to be reduced and curtailed. For example, on the night on which the Green Paper for Northern Ireland was produced, one tuned in to the Panorama Programme to see how they would deal with it and one found that they did not even mention it but they did put on that night a very interesting discussion of the problem of the Palestinian refugees which I would regard as an example of how a particular subject can be tackled and tackled very effectively by a television authority.
Another effect of the financial constraints has been the effect on the employment of artists who are important for the intellectual life of the community. It has had its effect on the use of RTE as a training ground for people who would form the basis of an Irish film industry. We must remember that RTE is not merely a broadcasting service but the major patron of the arts in Ireland. It is, for example, the major single employer of musicians and, apart from the Abbey Theatre, of actors. In other words, financial constraints in the authority are strangling the artistic life of the nation. I think it is important to pay some attention to this because as a people of three million or 4½ million, depending on your point of view, we are in competition to some extent with our neighbours across the water whose population reaches 55 million. If we compare the resources of the two nations, we find that ours compares very unfavourably but that does not absolve us from the necessity of trying to do the best we can in relation to our broadcasting services. We cannot obviously apply quantum measurements in this situation. For example, if we say that our population is one-tenth that of Great Britain, would it follow that we should be content with one-tenth of the news coverage? Obviously not, and I put it to the House that given the difference in resources, we may have to do that little bit extra in order to maintain standards at a high level, in spite of our size as a country.
Further to this, at a point when Ireland is entering Europe and hopefully taking its place, and as we hope a significant place, in that Community, financial constraints have precluded RTE from depicting life in the Community and bringing home to the viewing public the reality of Europe. My point in this regard will be conceded if we think back to the period of 1967-1968 when the then Director-General initiated moves which led to the excellent series, the "Into Europe" series. In a sense, this excellent series was before its time but I think that such programmes are necessary to open up an avenue of exploration into our European heritage and this is an excellent example of a television station being on top of its job and ahead of its time, but, as I say, it also happened to be the period of high financial viability on the part of the authority. They were fulfilling their role of bringing the public to a higher level of understanding of an important aspect of life. A station which is not continually looking into the heart of things may be open to the accusation of leaving the viewers on a plateau of unquestioning acceptance of the status quo. If this is the case I think the matter will have to be investigated and remedies made.
I am afraid that the financial constraints are easily seen in regard to the important question of Northern Ireland news. It seems incongruous that affairs of such importance to the nation should be receiving less attention from RTE by way of resources channelled in the Northern Ireland news operation than is the case in regard to the British television services. In saying this I hope nobody will understand me to suggest that I have anything but the highest respect for the personnel involved in that operation. They are, as I said last week, of a very high standard, comparable with any in Europe. At the same time, I think resources are not sufficient to enable them to do a job comparable, in visual terms at least, to other channels.
Even if one were to concede that the Northern Ireland news operation were successful, there is the further question of the news coverage of the rest of the country. If we are to retain and to increase our self respect as a nation, we must be prepared to provide the resources necessary in this respect—it is too important a matter to settle for the second best. We have in the community a press of very high standard, as I said last week, comparable to that of any country in the new EEC. I put it to the House that it is vital the same standards of comparable excellence should be achieved by our television services.
The third question in this matter of restraints relates to the necessity to cater for the competition of other stations in a significant area of the State. The Minister's speech states that RTE's capital expenditure on new works during 1971-72 was about £1.75 million. This, he said, includes £711,000 on wired television development. Approximately £748,000 was spent on general broadcasting works.
I have a few criticisms here which are intended to be constructive. In making these criticisms of the present situation in which RTE find themselves, by way of accidental discussion, I will mention how the situation could be improved. A discussion on the position in which the Irish television viewer finds himself must take as its basis the fact that in this country the viewing time for television programmes is essentially between 6 p.m. and 11.30 p.m. each day. In this we differ from other more organised societies where urbanisation and industrial organisation exist and where there are workers to enjoy programmes outside the hours I have mentioned. It follows that if there is to be any extension of broadcasting hours here it will have only the effect of tinkering with the system. Such an extension would be marginal only. If we want to have a more comprehensive service we will not get an adequate answer in the extension of the hours of the existing station. I am not referring to incidental, small extensions on, say, a Sunday afternoon. I am talking about major extensions on weekday evenings. There is no point in producing programmes for the crows: the programmes must have an audience.
Looking at the present service, I think the first thing that can be said about it is that it is generalised rather than comprehensive. If we examine any of the categories, for instance entertainment, we find there is not enough entertainment. If it is an information programme it is not detailed enough. The entertainment programme is not such that experiment is possible, but if there is an information programme, for instance, there is not enough time to have the programme sufficiently detailed. Assuming a certain level of educational ability, I am afraid all the programmes start from a certain level. How do we know, for example, that the educational programmes are not passing above the heads of those whom they were intended for?
In discussing the question of choice, we should remind ourselves of what I shall call a geographic freak. It is that half the television set-owning case for this rests on the following four grounds:
people of this State can receive three or four channels while the other half are confined to one. From whichever point we examine this we find it undesirable: it is undesirable for those of us who wish to see our community progress on a unified basis. Those of us who have given some thought to this are aware of the polarising effect of this on the community where one half is exposed to programmes of British origin and British standards and British interests and the other half are not. The point is obvious that there could be this polarising effect.
If we probe more closely we find that in areas of single station, and no choice, there are approximately 350,000 sets and in the multi-channel area there are 150,000 sets. Of those in the single channel, no choice area, about 50,000 or so, perhaps a somewhat larger number, can be wired economically to a co-axial relay system for reception of outside stations. Therefore, if one takes the view that the extension of choice could be achieved for 50,000 or perhaps 75,000 homes, somewhat in the region of 300,000 homes would still be deprived of a choice of programmes.
I do not need to emphasise in the House that I am not hitting at private enterprise here—far from it. I wish I had the service myself. What I am pointing out is that the solution of the problem on a national basis is not to be found by extension of relay systems.
At this point I wish to draw the attention of the House to a statement in the Proclamation of the Republic that all the children of the nation should be cherished equally. I think it has some application to the points I am now making, all the more so for those whose roots are in rural Ireland. If we base our examination, therefore, on the limitation of viewing times and the unsatisfactory generalised nature of the service and the necessity of providing equal treatment for all our citizens, one concludes that the solution to the problem lies in the provision of another service which, for the purpose of conveniences, I shall call RTE 2. The On economic grounds it is only through the provision of a second RTE service that the many remote and isolated communities, far removed from the major towns, will have available to them a choice of programmes. It would be prohibitively costly for the viewers, even if one could find an altruistic businessman prepared to wire up the whole country, to give choice of programme by that method. I need only hint at the analogous position in which rural dwellers find themselves in relation to the provision of ESB rural electrical schemes to make my point, and the ESB is a State company.
Secondly, RTE 2 is necessary on social grounds because the Radio Telefís Éireann Authority has, as part of its mandate, to extend the national broadcasting service throughout the community on a basis of equality of treatment for all.
Thirdly, it is necessary because, if there is to be an extension of choice to areas where no choice is now available, it is nationally desirable that editorial control be vested in Dublin rather than in London or Cardiff.
Fourthly, and related to the third point, it is inconsistent of this Oireachtas on the one hand to insist by statute—section 17 of the Broadcasting Act, 1960—that RTE shall bear in mind the national aims of preserving and developing the national culture and, on the other hand, either directly or by acquiescence to allow the situation to develop where RTE has to allow foreign services to be brought in. By directly I mean that RTE is not put in the position, because of capital allocations difficulties, of getting revenue by engaging in the work of provision of relay systems. By acquiescence I mean that RTE is precluded from making a political case that it is inconsistent with section 17 to engage in the widespread extension of foreign services. RTE cannot get up and make a political case that the Minister is permitting this situation to develop which is against the express provision of a statute of this House. It could be accused of political partisanship. But the case can be made in this House and this is the place to do it.
One might concede the case so far on the questions I have raised but still remain unconvinced. This is easily understandable because if the case rests simply on the points made so far and omits mention of programme content, to that extent one might be accused of having no regard to the most important consideration of all. All the background argument in the world falls down if it is not squarely based on matters of programme content. In discussing the benefits which would flow from this I wish to offer a criticism of the present situation. What benefits would flow from the provision of such a service? A moments reflection brings home to us that one of the drawbacks of the single channel service or the single channel no-choice area of reception is that very often the most worthwhile programmes are missed by the viewers.
I remember the praise which was given—and rightly so, I am told— to a programme in which the artist Seán Keating was discussing an art exhibition. I believe he turned in a virtuoso performance. There was another programme more recently which I missed, a "7 Days" programme on the drug problem. There are other programmes which would spring to the minds of Deputies immediately. The problem with a single channel service is that, for obvious reasons, there is no possibility of engaging in repeat performances of worthwhile programmes except on very rare occasions. I remember a programme I saw recently which won the Prix Italia, the Martin Cluxton programme, which I thought was an excellent one. If I had seen that on the first occasion I could have turned on to another programme on another channel when it was shown again but not so the person who is confined to a single choice. He either switches off or sits through the same programme if a repeat is shown. In other words, a single channel generalised service cannot easily show repeat programmes, programmes of merit which one might like to see again.
A further consideration I would put to the Minister in relation to the present situation is what I would describe as a difficult national situation. I am not referring to the North of Ireland. I am referring to the rate at which change is occurring in the community. The population is being inundated with Green Papers, White Papers, EEC documents, proposals on higher education, IDA regional plans, our own recent proposals about votes at 18, and constitutional amendments. Given the present straitjacket in which the authority finds itself, it cannot devote a large part of an evening or even of a succession of evenings to these important topics. Referenda are being brought in now with such frequency that they are in danger of being treated with a degree of familiarity which assumes that what is being proposed is acceptable and good for the community. I know that we in this House do our best to tease out the issues but is there not a case for the proper and full discussion of these various national interests on our television station? If, as I shall mention in a moment, in another context, it is the function of television to stand critically apart from the society in which it operates, then under its present conditions RTE cannot do the job satisfactorily. The kind of information service which the community deserves cannot be forthcoming to the degree of detail and interest which I suggest is necessary for the discussion of these problems.
If, on the other hand, we had a second channel, we could afford to examine in more depth the national questions which are exercising the minds of the people. This is because we could escape from the generalised nature of the present service which must not do anything which would alienate substantial blocs of viewers. To take an example of specialised areas of, say, agriculture, these cannot be examined to the degree necessary if our farming community is to understand, for example, the problems of accession to Europe. Even if farming programmes were scheduled for a substantial period of time there is the question that they might not be of interest to the whole community. One could cite urban problems which might not necessarily interest the rural viewers.
I, therefore, conclude that the decision to provide a choice must be made and made as quickly as possible. Apart from these informational requirements we have also got the educational needs of the community. We are in a period of change. The demand for information is great. There is also the need for educational material for different groups in society. We hear a lot of talk by economists and others about adaptation, the problems of small farmers, small industries, specialised and exposed industries. There is then the great question, which is exercising the minds of European educationalists, the problem of adult education, of what the French call éducation permanente. I am not advocating a channel with a didactic intellectual highbrow character. Not for a moment am I suggesting that a second choice must be all Mahler and Mansholt. I am suggesting that RTE be given the opportunity of programme discrimination in respect of various groups which cannot now be catered for in the existing service.
Another consideration which I think is important and which will no doubt commend itself to the Minister and many Members of the House is the very laudable interest which the average Irishman has in sport. I do not agree with those people who disregard those of us who find great pleasure in looking at the various types of sport we see on television. In fact, it could be stated that as a nation we are probably more sport-conscious than many but there is a difficulty that large segments of sport do not lend themselves readily to showing on a single channel if only for the reason that as an eminent golfer is about to drop a putt into a hole you cannot break for advertising or if another eminent person is about to score nobody can say: "We will stop here and put on an advertising slot." Therefore, sport does not lend itself easily to the requirements of a single-channel service with frequent advertising slots.
I should like to give the example of what happens on radio on Saturday afternoons. The channels divide and on the medium wave you have sport and on the VHF wave you have music or drama.
The service I am suggesting could run alongside the present one during peak viewing times from 7 p.m. to 10.30 p.m. and initially a seven-day service would thus require about 24 hours viewing time with a possible close-down in July and August when viewing is light. The home-produced content would form a substantial part of the output while programmes of merit from the existing foreign channels could be used to supplement the output. Nothing I have said so far should be taken as suggesting that any restriction be placed on those private commercial concerns which are prepared to provide a relay service. I can say that a number of times because one is often subjected to selective misquotation which I regard as a form of intellectual dishonesty.
This is obviously a free country and if such people are prepared to offer facilities to willing customers all praise to them. What we must keep constantly in mind is that we in this Oireachtas have responsibility to all our citizens to face up to a decision in the near future as to whether we content ourselves with allowing an extension of choice to a further urban segment of the population, good though that may be in itself, without catering for the needs of our rural dwellers. We should remember that a significant majority will be left if we do not face up courageously to the decision which I have outlined which will see that all parts of our community get a fair chance of service. I would like the Minister to consider those aspects of criticism which I have made of the present service and to see if he could meet me to some extent in some of the points I have made.
I want to refer to another aspect of the present service which may not spring immediately to the minds of Deputies but which is of extreme importance in relation to the RTE station's output or to that of any other station for that matter. I refer to what is called "competitive scheduling". In situations where television stations are in competition it has been observed that audiences tend to watch one or other channel right through the evening. A controller of programmes is, therefore, anxious to capture as large an audience as possible for his channel. He can do this in a number of ways. Firstly, he can build up a viewing loyalty to his station's output which induces in the viewer a tendency to try his product as a matter of first choice. Secondly, he can put on popular programmes early in the peak viewing period after which, given the nature of the medium, the viewer, as has been observed, will tend to stay with him to view the next programme. In comparison with a political campaign in which the masters of that art know that to peak later is better than to peak too soon. It is desirable in television terms to peak early because the television controller who gets his audiences early will, in the ordinary course of events, for various reasons which would take too long to explain now, hold them.
In many cases a programme of public service content, however excellent it may be, may tend to lose viewers. This point could be developed at great length but I do not intend to do so except to suggest that there is a pressure on programme controllers to emphasise the popular and minority programmes are sometimes left to find a non-peak slot in the late evening. Now, given the necessarily generalised nature of RTE's output and the requirement of putting on important public service programmes of less popular appeal it is evident that in competition with outside stations our national service is fighting with one hand behind its back. If one examines the position of the BBC with its two programmes one sees immediately the ease with which that organisation can achieve internal complementarity and at the same time be externally competitive. By internal complementarity I mean that if on one of the organisation's channels a public service programme is being shown on the second channel a more popular one can be shown.
I suggest that our television service must be put in the position in which it will be able to enter into the competitive scheduling race with a little more ease so that it too can achieve the facilities of internal complementarity and external competitiveness. Such a situation would require the services of a controller of programmes on RTE 1 and RTE 2 with a coordinating controller whose mandate would be to secure the complementarity and competitiveness I spoke of. While I cannot prove the following point I have a feeling it is not too far from the mark. I hold the view that competition between rival organisations on television tends towards similarity of programme output, towards a lessening or lowering of standards, perhaps, or to an emphasis on the less-worthwhile type of programme.
Competition, on the other hand, between units of the same television organisation leads to a raising of standards. At any given moment what is popular is likely to be capable of easy anticipation. Television authorities wish to attract as large a proportion of the audience as possible. A station in RTE's present position will be orientated towards mass appeal. Even if there were not present the requirement of satisfying advertisers, there would be the ever present categorical imperative of professional communicators, that is, to reach the largest audience possible.
If a second choice is to be offered to the public from within the national broadcasting system, communicators can afford more easily at times to disregard that imperative because it can be taken for granted that a second service output is likely to be of a public service nature or at least there is the possibility that greater discrimination in favour of viewers is possible on whichever channel the public service interest programme is broadcast.
In this connection it is interesting to be aware of what happened across the water when Independent Television found themselves faced with a competitor who had this choice to offer. We notice that their answer was to stress the local nature of the 13 constituent stations. The tendency to exploit that local interest to the full was their method of trying to provide the extra facilities which their competitors had achieved by the provision of a second service.
I turn now to some technical aspects of the question, aspects which can be achieved within the framework of the 1960 Broadcasting Act. This Oireachtas will have to face the technical questions involved, keeping in mind the existing statutory provisions enshrined in the 1960 Broadcasting Act and statutory obligations which we laid on the shoulders of the national broadcasting service. Provision of choice could be effected by allowing RTE or some other group to set up a transmission system or systems to pick up and broadcast outside signals. The first factor that springs to mind in this regard is the enormous cost that would be involved in doing this. Secondly, if done by RTE, it would give rise to the totally anomalous position in which the authority would be engaged in cutting its own throat apart altogether from the expressed will of the Oireachtas as contained in the stipulations of the 1960 Act. For example there would be the difficulties of copyright and extra payments to foreign actors' unions, to mention only two factors. Thirdly, to allow commercial interests to engage in this activity of transmission would be to hand over to entrepreneurs the profit-making possibilities in a field in which successive Governments have guarded jealously the rights of the Oireachtas.
I have spoken already on the wired relay system and have drawn the attention of the House to the point that any extension through this method would have the effect of giving a choice of programme to urban centres with consequent disregard of the more remote areas. Already, I have mentioned the ESB analogy but there is no need to labour this point. If one sees the solution to the problem in this avenue of wired relay systems it might be pertinent to ask who will wire Kenmare, Newcastlewest, parts of Tipperary and other parts of rural Ireland.
The technical problems involved in providing a choice of programmes to the whole community can best be met by authorising RTE to develop their own technical system. This would require seven stations—four VHF and three UHF. Some cost would be involved in re-equipping the studio at Donnybrook and there could also be integration, with provision of coverage, into the whole Northern Ireland area from the new transmitter that is to be set up near Clermount Cairn, Carlingford. I suggest that this be done as speedily as possible.
Approaching the matter from the financial point, apart from the initial cost, there would be the question of the method of financing the station. Desirably the cost of setting up the service would be by way of repayable Exchequer advances such as we have had during the past ten years. I would suggest that running costs be paid for in a similar manner as at present, that is, by a combination of advertisements and licence fees. The Minister must be aware that periodic adjustments will be required if our television services are to execute properly the function that we require of them. I am not advocating nor am I allowed to advocate the raising of the licence fees but I am realist enough to know that at some point in the next few years it will be necessary to raise the level of licence fees. I am suggesting to the Minister that, as he will have to make a case for the raising of the fee at some time in the future, it would be much better to be able to offer viewers something for their money such as RTE 2 service which I have outlined in my remarks.
I have said that advertisements should be carried on both services. The reason for this is that the national pool of advertising is limited and RTE share a given quantum of this with other media. If we had the situation of advertisements on one channel and none on the other, there would be a danger of schedules of public service or minority interest programmes losing money but as between the two programmes, RTE's share of the total revenue would be maintained. In relation to advertising the law of diminishing returns obtains.
The quality of our television station's output is determined to a great extent by the moral of the organisation. Under conditions which I have outlined I would foresee a dramatic improvement in the climate of opinion within the station. There would be better opportunities for drama and documentaries, which programmes could thrust a little more deeply into an examination of the problems of our society. There would be less time constraint. There would be a lessening of pressures and, probably, there would be a more spirited and higher quality output.
RTE are now in a trapped situation because the amount of time available to them is limited. They are trapped also by reason of the programme "mix" being constant. Deputies need only refer to the proportions devoted to the various categories during the last few years in any of the RTE reports. The share given to news, drama, et cetera, is fixed because of the exigencies of a single channel service and because of the necessity of providing a generalised service. On the other hand, if we were to open up to them opportunities by the departures I have suggested, we could have extra home produced programmes with a striking increase and boosting of morale.
I wish to refer briefly to a related point, that is, the provision of a colour television service. Very often RTE are criticised because their programme content does not contain a high level of colour transmissions. Some understanding of the problems involved leads one to place RTE's present achievement in perspective. There are three stages by which a broadcasting organisation gears itself for colour television: first, by showing imported series; secondly, by doing outside broadcasts in colour and, thirdly, by originating studio material in colour. In relation to the first stage I mentioned, it is interesting to note that one-third of the imported series now goes out in colour on RTE. This has resulted in the purchase of telecine equipment. I should imagine that it is difficult now to buy black and white equipment because of the changes taking place in the industry. In a sense the decision to introduce colour has been taken out of the hands of RTE in that, if rival stations have it, we must have it also.
The second point I mentioned was in regard to the outside broadcasting unit. Of the two at present at the disposal of the station one is in colour and is used, as Deputies may know, for sporting events such as the Sweeps Derby, the Aga Khan Trophy, the All Ireland Final and so on. Since some of these events are relayed outside the country it is obvious that they have to be done in colour.
It is in the third category of studio-originated material that the least progress has been made. The importance of this may be underlined if one remembers that, if the Taoiseach or any other prominent member of the Government or the Opposition were, for any reason to give a news conference on, say, a British channel, that interview would come across to the British viewers as a black and white interlude in a colour news programme. That simple illustration would point up the necessity for a thorough look at this problem. In any event, the basic problem is this, that if RTE is going to have to pay for expensive re-equipment they might as well go for colour, and after 11 years or whatever it is, of service some of their equipment must now be obsolete.
I should like to ask the Minister if, in relation to his powers, he has put any restriction on the number of hours of colour television broadcasting and, if so, what are the reasons for these restrictions. One reason for a restriction is obvious: given that sets must be imported, I could see a strain on the balance of payments situation. This country is not sufficiently endowed with nature's resources to be able to expend large sums of money in this regard. However, given that the Minister has referred to the Ericcson project for the provision of telephone equipment to be produced in this country, is there any possibility that some similar firm might go into the production of colour television sets? Not that I advocate a wide extension of these—there are probably other priorities—but if they have to be produced for those who want them could they not be produced in this country rather than be adding to the balance of payments situation?
Briefly, I want to refer to the RTE Authority's functions in relation to education. It has been stated many a time that the function of television and of broadcasting in general is to provide information, entertainment and education. A moment ago I referred to the necessity for adequate provision for adult education viewed in the light of what the French call l'éducation permanente, continuing, lifelong educational programmes for people, continuing, lifelong development of the imagination, of critical attitudes to life, of broadening human experience, to which TV can contribute so much.
It is the aim of most services to reach those who may have been left out of the educational race in the normal instructional sense. Experience shows that those most in need of such a service avail themselves of those services, perhaps, to the smallest extent. I referred earlier in my remarks to the question of choice of programme, and I stated that instructional programmes are increasingly desirable for groups in our community, and there is no need to repeat what I have said. In the field of educational television RTE acts as an agent for our Department of Education, and it is well that we should understand precisely what happens in these cases. RTE translates the wishes of the Department of Education into broadcasting terms at a cost of £80,000 per annum. However, if progress is to be made the tentative co-operation of the last few years must be replaced by policies on a firmer footing.
In this connection there is obviously need for new thinking, firstly, for the provision of new facilities as required; secondly, for the extension of the hours of broadcasting, particularly with educational requirements in mind. I would exempt these from the comment I made earlier that extension of hours is not fruitful; it is obvious that it is fruitful in relation to specific educational programmes beamed at individual groups. This extension of hours of broadcasting is a ministerial function and I should like the Minister, when replying, to let me know if it is his intention to make this extension.
Thirdly, there is a need for a clear directive from the Department of Education as to its policies and priorities. It is proper public policy to beam programmes towards the post-primary level, but I wonder if the House can continue to be satisfied with the present situation in which educational programmes on television are not beamed to the primary level of education. I leave that for other Deputies to take up if they wish to do so.
An interesting development in the general field is the development of the video cassette which enables programmes to be recorded and used at times to suit the class schedule rather than the schedule of the broadcaster. This, as any practising teacher would know, is a vitally important development, because the hour of broadcasting of educational material may not be the one to suit a particular educational establishment. If the programme can be captured on a recording machine, a video cassette, not alone can it be shown at times suitable to the establishment in question but it can be stopped at various places and times for elaboration by the teacher on the subject content of these films. It will be agreed that it is vitally important to be able to pause at given points in a programme to elaborate and explain more fully.
I wish to conclude this section of my remarks with a brief reference to open university projects. The Government should give some attention to the Irish requirement in this field. I understand that the enrolment of Irish students for the open university courses on the BBC channel has not been possible, but a close eye should be kept on developments in this field. Come to think of it, entering into this particular field would be one way in which a second channel could justify its creation.
I now wish to speak more generally about the television service. As I mentioned earlier, we discuss in the Dáil under subhead L.1—Grants for General Purposes equivalent to Net Receipts from Broadcasting Licence Fees—the whole subject of television broadcasting. I think the time has come to examine in some depth the place of television in our society—this particularly because I understand the Minister has set up a committee which is to advise him during the next 12 months or so about the problems which now beset our television service.
The first point I should like to make is that, historically, this Oireachtas has taken the view that the ultimate responsibility for the broadcasting services should rest with Oireachtas Éireann. In the earlier years of the State this was necessitated by technical limitations in that there were very few frequencies available to broadcasters and the matter was determined by the 1926 Wireless Telegraphy Act by which the Minister was given sole power to acquire and establish broadcasting stations and to maintain and operate them.
In 1960, the Oireachtas decided to set up a public authority to operate the television service. This Act marked the handing over from the Minister to an authority constituted as a trust in which, apart from the responsibility for regulating hours of broadcasting and power to direct the authority under section 31, it was left to the authority to get on with the job of making programmes. Section 31 says:
The Minister may direct the Authority in writing to refrain from broadcasting any particular matter or matter of any particular class and the Authority shall comply.
It would be fair to say that the Oireachtas envisaged that this power would be in the nature of a reserve power only to be used if the public interest so required. If the power had to be exercised either the authority was failing in its duty or if it was not failing in its duty the Minister would have committed an error of judgment in exercising his function in putting on a section 31 notice.
Before going on to refer to the recent and only exercise of this ministerial function, I should like for a few moments to make some general comments by way of placing television in its context as a public service. It can be accepted that television has evolved as the means by which communicators keep a close eye on the political process and on politicians in particular. It is a service which in most countries is worked by people of a left-of-centre temperament who are concerned professionally to examine critically the society in which they operate. Their field is the field of the creative and as a group they are not necessarily representative of a cross-section of the people taken as a whole. They are marked by a desire for self-expression and, as I said in another context, their imperative is to communicate. In particular, they seek to give expression to problems which have not yet found expression in the political field and to dissipate the cozy apathy in which politicians flourish.
One effect of this has been that television practitioners are emerging as a fifth estate standing over against society, fulfilling with their colleagues of the press the vital function of continuing scrutiny which is essential to the exercise of democracy. As a profession they derive their rights to function, not from the politician though he may seek to regulate the exercise of their rights, but directly from the society which they serve.
I would therefore disagree with what the late Taoiseach, Seán Lemass, said in October, 1966, after a rather trivial dispute concerning the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries. The Minister in question complained to the Telefís Éireann newsrooms and the NFA statement was omitted from later bulletins on that occasion. Our society generally attacked the Minister and the Government at that time for his interference and it occasioned a reply given to this House in October of that year which is quoted from the Official Report, Volume 224, column 1045 and quoted in Senator Professor Kelly's book. I quote the former Taoiseach's statement.
Radio Telefís Éireann was set up by legislation as an instrument of public policy and as such is responsible to the Government. The Government have overall responsibility for its conduct and especially the obligation to ensure that its programmes do not offend against the public interest or conflict with national policy as defined in legislation.
To this extent the Government reject the view that Radio Telefís Éireann should be either generally or in regard to its current affairs and news programmes, completely independent of Government supervision... it has the duty while maintaining impartiality between political parties... to sustain public respect for the institutions of Government and, where appropriate, to assist public understanding of the policies enshrined in legislation enacted by the Oireachtas. The Government will take such action ... as may be necessary to ensure that Radio Telefís Éireann does not deviate from the due performance of this duty.
As I shall mention later in my remarks and as Senator Professor Kelly mentions in his book, no one will disagree that radio and television should not offend against the public interest but the latter is not synonymous with the immunity of Government policy from criticism, a point which I will take up later.
I have said that the practitioners in television derive their right to operate and function in their profession directly from society and the politician also derives his title deeds, if I may so put it, from society, but his mandate differs in important respects from that of the television communicator. If only to mention one point, the politician or the public representative is responsible for the good ordering of society and the maintenance of the institutions of State. The 1960 Broadcasting Act was the response of Oireachtas Éireann to the very difficult task of compromise between the rigid ministerial control of the pre-1953 period before certain changes were made and a state of broadcasting autonomy which very few would advocate.
A furious debate rages as to the power of the television medium. On the one hand, it is said that television merely reinforces attitudes already in existance in the viewer, that the effect on behaviour is minimal after a period of four to six years, as was outlined in Belson's book, The Impact of Television. On the other hand, there are complaints that television leads to violence, that the camera is never neutral, that there is an inevitable tendency to simplify and distort, that there is an emphasis on the dramatic, which in itself is a falsification.
Whatever be the truth of the matter, politicians as a group are wary of television and seek to control it in ways which would never occur to them to employ with a non-broadcasting news medium. If we compare the following statutory provision in section 18 of the 1960 Act with the editorial freedom of the press, the point will be seen:
It shall be the duty of the authority to secure that, when it broadcasts any information, news or feature which relates to matters of public controversy or is the subject of current public debate, the information, news or feature is presented objectively and impartially and without any expression of the authority's own views.
Think for a moment of a statutory injunction to editors of newspapers couched in those terms and we see immediately the fundamental difference between the two media. It is in these very fields of information, news and features that television fulfils its essential public service role.
I have already mentioned its role in the field of education and in the field of entertainment. These, oddly enough, are not included in section 18. It is in the field of information that the public service responsibility of the station is most clearly seen. Traditionally, it has been assumed that a free press is essential to the proper functioning of democracy. In our increasingly complex modern society television broadcasting is increasing in influence to the point at which, as I have said, it may be regarded as a Fifth Estate providing the necessary channels of information which help society to function. It is clear that it is in the area of information that politicians are most tempted to intervene.
It is natural, I suppose, in a situation in which many people in broadcasting began their careers as journalists that they should be conscious of the journalistic ethos and, from that point of view, it should be fruitful to examine for a moment any differences which may be said to exist between the exercise of the profession in the broadcasting medium as distinct from the written media. The greatest difference I can see is that press journalism operates in an ethos of freedom. Television journalism, on the other hand, operates in an atmosphere of constraint which contrasts with the relatively wide-open-space atmosphere in which collegues in the press operate. If I were asked to give a quick answer as to the differences, I would say that they could be expressed in terms of "image" and "idea". I should hasten to add that, as a lay observer, I do not pretend to be able to give definitive views on these matters. However, it behoves us to try to come to grips with the essentials.
Television can be said to be a paradoxical instrument in that it combines the twin characteristics of tremendous impact and ephemerality. The ephemerality of television is obvious. Each night's contribution fades into the air. Only a small quantum of material is recorded for future reference in the field of news and current affairs. The impact of television renders necessary some public statutory involvement in the exercise of its power, but television's essential ephemerality means that, unlike the press, where one can refer back to the previous printed message, the effect of the television message is instantaneous. Its influence is measured in terms of impact/image rather than the reflective/logical apprehension of often complex ideas. If the Minister wants to know what any of his friends or enemies are thinking about all he has to do is read back over the newspaper files or the reports of this House. On the other hand, what is said about him in broadcasting has to be caught on the wing.
There is a further aspect in that television is a relatively new phenomenon in society, a phenomenon to which no organised community has as yet fully adapted. There is also the undeniable fact that there is a conferring of status in the expression of views on television, irrespective of whose views they are or by whom expressed. It follows from that that a heavy measure of responsibility rests on those who select any particular item for discussion. There is no set of rules to guide those involved and we have to rely on the good sense of professional broadcasters to act with a proper respect for the power of the medium through which they operate. It is in this connection that I wish to refer to the operation of section 31.
On 18th November of last year during the discussion on this Estimate the Minister said:
On 1st October, following the appearance of members of an illegal organisation on the "7 Days" programme, I invoked section 31 of the Act and directed the Authority in writing to refrain from broadcasting any matter of the following class, i.e., any matter that could be calculated to promote the aims or activities of any organisation which engages in, promotes, encourages or advocates the attaining of any particular objective by violent means.
In referring to the circumstances which led to the implementation of this section I want to examine a little more deeply the events and circumstances surrounding it and to point some areas of concern. Viewed from any standpoint, it is noticeable that continual contention is a feature of the television condition. Given that television is peopled with those who are by temperament creative, searching, liberal and left-of-centre, if I may use that phrase, there is bound to be from time to time pressure from below, pressure which I would explain as pressure from producers to experiment, to try out the dramatic, and, to endeavour to give greater insight into problems. The great imperative of these people is to communicate and those in the authority who have to make judgements, having refused a particular request for a programme to discuss a particular problem on three or four occasions, may come to question the basis on which they continue to refuse the request and, on any given issue, those in control will probably say to themselves: "If I am in doubt I should put on the programme" rather than: "If I am in doubt I should keep it off".
Further to this, there is the situation in which people engaged in the control of programmes may be preoccupied with non-programming matters. They may, for example, be haggling with the Department of Posts and Telegraphs about finance. They may be dealing with trade unions in relation to matters concerning their members. They may be running from one meeting to another. Whatever the situation, it could happen that in some circumstances, due to pressure and lack of time, errors of judgement may be made in allowing certain material to be shown. There is also the related point that our television practitioners have an entrée to other journalists and creative people in other media, particularly in the press. In those circumstances people who refuse to put on particular programmes may be classed as “right wing”, conservative and so forth. It is obvious that these upward pressures in television must be counterbalanced by other pressures from organised society if a reasonable equilibrium is to be maintained. These counterbalancing pressures are essential if the station's output is not to move too far ahead of its viewing public and organised society has the duty to exert an influence to ensure that institutions of the State are safeguarded from unfair attack.
In saying this I am not to be understood as stating that an exposé of social ills such as money lending or the problem of speculative building in our cities is an attack on the institutions of the State. Programmes dealing with housing problems, for example, can be discussed without any great effect one way or the other on the national interest and we must be careful not to confuse the interests of any party which may find itself in Government with the national interests. It is obvious that in societies in which these pressures which I have outlined are equalised the television service most readily fulfils in a responsible fashion its unique and essential role in the community. At another point I intend to refer very briefly to the area of authority and director-general activities which in many ways can be regarded as the junction box where these pressures are, perhaps, most in evidence.
Previous debates on this issue have referred to the circumstances in which section 31 came to be used. The House might like to reflect that the Taoiseach, as constitutional leader of this State, went to Chequers to meet his British and Northern Ireland counterparts and returned. What was the first response of our national television service? It was to put on persons whose avowed aim is to overthrow the institutions of the State. I think this was an error of judgment but the question is: did it merit the full rigours of a section 31 directive?
The first thing which must be done in this area is to make a clear distinction between, on the one hand, ordinary social and economic and even political problems which engage the attention of the public and on the other, the matter which was the subject of the directive. I have spoken in this House before— from recollection, on 3rd March, 1971 —on the important question of the extent to which our educationalists in previous decades, perhaps, unwittingly, placed over-emphasis on the physical force tradition in our historical evolution to the unnecessary downgrading of the importance of the constitutional case. It is idle to pretend that in regard to this question of physical force the Irish body politic is other than in a position similar to that of a haemophiliac; scratch the surface of constitutionalism in this country and you expose the patient to problems of serious political ill-health. A whole area of our history in recent times was filled with echoes of Thompson guns and it is only 16 years ago since members of the Minister's party walked in funeral procession behind those who had adopted a self-inflicted mandate in relation to the then existing problems of Northern Ireland.
One effect of Partition has been the unfortunate tendency towards political in-breeding in this part of the country which has led to unhealthy political symptoms in our society.
