I wish to share my time with my colleague, Deputy Sheehan.
West Cork TV Reception.
There is now a huge sense of outrage and grievance in the south west Cork area because community television has either been taken off the air or threats have been made to do so. The people of Bandon, Clonakilty and Kinsale, and many other towns and villages, have enjoyed multi-channel television programmes for many years solely from community television. There had been no rental, no connection fee and no hidden extras. A voluntary contribution of pounds 30 annually is made to cover outgoings. Essentially, the people were fully satisfied with the service provided at the cost of a box of matches per day.
It is alleged that this service is illegal. I totally reject this approach. What is available in south west Cork is the same service which is available on overspill in the eastern parts of the country. Is the suggestion being made that what is legal on the east coast is illegal on the west coast? Furthermore, why is there so much pressure in particular being exerted on Cork? Deflector systems are operating all along the west coast. One gets the impression that Cork has been singled out to be put off the air. I am interested in the situation in Galway, in particular.
I have no objection to the MMDS system offered by Cork multi-channel TV, being allowed to operate side by side with Community TV. The old saying is that competition is the life of trade. I do seriously object to any question of a monopoly. If the MMDS system is as good as is suggested, why does it not compete with Community TV?
There is of course the question of cost. A voluntary subscription of pounds 30 a year is in sharp contrast to installation fees for MMDS of £130-£160 and the annual fee of £140-£160. In addition, I understand that there is a further £95 charge for a movie channel and a £73 a year charge for Sky Sports. The contrast on cost is enormous, but it is a matter for the private commercial organisation in charge of Cork Multi Channel to justify these charges. I regard it as entirely unacceptable that people should be forced to pay these charges. This will have the effect of putting Community TV off the air.
The further effect of course is that there are many elderly people and others living in deprived circumstances who have come to rely on Community TV over the years and who now just will not be able to afford the other system. For them the result of the shutdown is that multi-channel viewing will be finished as far as they are concerned.
Is this what the Minister wants? Is this what the Government had in mind when the original licence was granted to Cork Multi-Channel in 1989 by the then Minister, Deputy R. Burke, to cover Cork county and Waterford? Is it that some form of monopoly was provided for by the 1989 agreement and that the payment was the paltry sum of £20,000 pounds plus 5 per cent royalties? Various commitments were made prior to the election by both Fianna Fáil and Labour. The then Minister for Tourism, Transport and Communications, now Minister for Jusice, Deputy Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, was fully understanding of the concerns of the National Community TV Association and was going to arrange for the examination of the monopoly position of MMDS operators under competition legislation. She was also going to examine the role of deflector systems in the provision of multi-channel services.
Members of the Labour Party were even more forthcoming. Specific promises to introduce amending legislation were made by some of them. Even since the election the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Deputy M. Higgins, in Cork on 5 February committed himself to conducting an "extensive and thorough review of community TV policy". he also said he would be looking at ways in which community broadcasting could be advanced. However, every effort to get him to respond to parliamentary questions on the issue has been evaded so far in that he has refused to answer any question on this commitment. Such questions have been tranferred to the Minister for Transport. Energy and Communications. The worth of all those commitments given by Fianna Fáil and Labour Ministers, TDs and Senators must now be open to major question. If it was possible before the election to look at the issue of further licences to relay or rebroadcast TB channels, surely it can be done now. I am asking the Minister to give an unequivocal commitment to do just that so as to ensure that viewers in the south west Cork area can continue in the future to receive TV channels at a reasonable cost.
Let me impress on the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications the serious situation throughout the entire Cork South-West constituency where thousnds of residents who enjoyed the benefits of the South Coast TV network are subjected to relentless pressure and threats of legal action by agents of the Cork MMDS organisation, who seem to be imposing their monopoly in relaying a multi-channel television service throughout County Cork and west Waterford.
The present shut down of the system in west Cork is a direct result of the relent less pressure brought to bear by that organisation. Local residents are frustrated that the MMDS system has been given the monopoly by the Department of Transport, Energy and Communications. The people are highly critical of MMDS. Will the Minister explain why it is perfectly acceptable for MMDS to operate without hindrance alongside deflector systems in Galway, Sligo, Waterford and many other counties, but is not to be permissible in west Cork? Why treat the people of my area with such contempt? Why is the Minister so uncharitable as to give this monopoly to one group, thereby preventing the weakest section of the community — the old, the infirm and the unemployed — from enjoying the same facility as their counterparts in other parts of the country? Will the Minister explain why open competition is allowed along the east coast and parts of the west when citizens in the south and south west are denied this facility. Moreover, people are afraid that the MMDS system, which is a microwave system, could be, and perhaps is highly dangerous to the health of all those who live in the area where it is in operation.
Furthermore, may I remind the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications that his counterpart, the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Deputy M. Higgins, promised that an extensive survey into community TB will be carried out in the very near future. Furthermore, the Fianna Fáil and Labour Parties gave a commitment to review the position on national community TV. Why are the parties which comprise the partnership Government now reneging on their promises? I call on the Minister to let commonsense prevail and allow South Coast Community TV to operate as usual in the areas where it has given such a successful service over the past seven years at a minimal cost by re-beaming the signal, something which involves no health hazards.
I am surprised to find this issue raised again in the Chamber so soon after our last debate, as my colleague the Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications Deputy Cowen, explained, this issue in some detail to the Deputies on 10 February last. It has been Government policy for some time now that the legal means of bringing mullti-channel choice to the noncabled public, is through fully licensed MMDS systems. There are no plans to review this policy issue at the moment. It is not the case that viewers in Cork South-West are denied the privilege of multi-channel viewing by our refusal to grant a licence to illegal deflector operators for the transmission of such services in the area. The simple truth of the matter is that under the Wireless Telegraphy (Wired Broadcast Relay Licence) Regulations, 1989, Cork Communications Ltd. has been granted an exclusive licence to retransmit television programmes services to homes in County Cork and West Waterford.
Due to the constraints of good frequency management, the licence is exclusive and was issued only after an open competition for the franchise — a competition open even to the operators of the illegal deflector systems.
We are aware that private actions, and the threat of action taken under the Planning Acts and before the High Court, have resulted in the closure of a number of illegal transmitters in the Cork region recently. Our information is that the MMDS multi-channel service is available to all those homes in the Cork region which were receiving illegal services until recently and this fact has been advertised extensively in the local press throughout Cork. The contention, therefore, that multi-channel services are not available is far from accurate.
I hope Deputies are not suggesting that what is illegal in Cork is legal in the east.
Due to frequency management, United Kingdom terrestrial services are available off air in certain eastern areas through sheer proximity to UK broadcasting transmitters. In Cork, however, these signals are picked up by illegal operators, boosted and retransmitted by them n unlicensed wireless telegraphy equipment in breach of the Wireless Telegraphy Acts of 1926 and 1988.
These services are available and are being provided in an orderly and legal fashion in a part of the radio frequency spectrum which will not prevent or hinder the development of our own national television services in the future, be it RTE, Teilifís na Gaeilge and any future national television service independent of RTE services.
Successive Governments, including those in which the Deputies opposite participated have examined this problem a number of times at length and have concluded without exception that it would be neither practical nor in the national interest to licence the illegal rebroadalluded to by the Deputies.
As was explained here on 10 February last, the basic problem with the deflector systems is that they operate in a part of the UHF frequency band which is governed by an international treaty. Under the treaty there are simply not enough frequencies available to Ireland to enable a nationwide network of deflector transmitters to be established and at the same time meet other national requirements, such as RTE's frequency requirements.
The fact of the matter is that if the noncabled public want multi-channel television — and all the evidence is that the vast majority of them do — then MMDS is the only practicable option open to us at present to provide it. The technical and international binding constraints on us with regard to the use of the radio frequency spectrum. and particularly that part of it used by deflector systems, are such that we believe it is not possible to legalise them.
The plain truth of the matter is that we simply do not have access to sufficient frequencies, first, to allow country-wide operation of community or deflector systems and secondly, to give viewers in non-cabled areas something approaching the choice of television programmes which are available in cabled areas and still conserve frequency spectrum to meet foreseeable developments in Irish broadcasting.
Much is often made of the supposed cost differential between services provided by the properly licensed companies, such as Cork Communications Ltd., and those provided by the illegal deflector services. Unfailingly, such comparisons do not compare like with like. The transmission facility per MMDS cell can cost up to £250,000. There will be up to 29 cells throughout the country. Up to £250-£300 worth of equipment has to be installed in each subscriber's premises.
Deputies can readily appreciate, therefore, that the investment required is sizeable by any standards. The annual cost to an MMDS subscriber will approximate to the subscriber charge for the more modern cable systems installed in recent years, i.e. around £100-£124 rental per annum. While the costs are dearer than "deflectors" the comparisons made are invalid. The MMDS system is an 11-channel service and MMDS operators must pay licence fees — £20,000 in advance and 5 per cent of annual rental — VAT and copyright fees , obligations avoided by the "deflectors", because of their illegal status. Many people complain about the installation charge of around £100 to £125 for MMDS, but forget that every deflector subscriber had to have a UHF aerial installed which we believe in many instances cost £100 or more. In its franchise area, Cork Communications Ltd. has spent in the region of £3 million on its MMDS infrastructure to date and plants to spend £12 million in total. Added to that is the very significant employment being generated in the region. The number of people employed by Cork Communications Ltd. has grown from 60 to 120 with the advent of MMDS and I understand that the company has plans to employ even more in the future.
To conclude, I would say that I am not unappreciative of the fact that there has been some controversy about the introduction of MMDS. I sympathise with those, who have become accustomed to the illegal deflector services. Nevertheless, I would counsel caution against those who pretend that there are easy solutions to this problem. MMDS provides the possibility of a professional, high quality multi-channel service on a countrywide basis at a reasonable cost. The service is now available in counties Dublin, Kildare, Louth-Meath, Wexford, Cork, Kerry, Clare, Galway, Sligo, Roscommon and Offaly, and I understand that there are in excess of 28,500 subscribers, of which 3.500 are in the Cork region. I trust that these facts put the matter in context for the Cork Deputies and that they will communicate the position to their very fine constituents.
Why is it the two systems work in tandem in Galway but not in cork?
The Minister should try giving that speech in Galway.