There is a land grab going on. RTE is the most commercial and more power to it. It does a brilliant job. We have the utmost respect for it but there is an inherent unfairness in what is going on. That unfairness must be addressed and the only people who can do that are in the Oireachtas. RTE is proposing a further land grab. As members are aware, a digital platform is being launched. That will allow it to multiply and quadruple the number of channels available. While we have no objection whatsoever to RTE going digital and going on a digital platform, there is a need to address the issue of public service, where it begins and ends, and the issue of commercial activity. There is a need to cap the commercial activities in this new digital world.
Additional channels mean more broadcasting time and across more channels which will create more audiences. Some of the individual audiences may be smaller but, collectively, they will be greater. More channels and more broadcast time will create more advertising opportunities. More advertising opportunities will drive down the cost of TV advertising which in turn will attract new and different advertisers. I am sorry to say it is our advertisers who will be attracted. Here again there is an issue that must be addressed. In approving the new digital proposals and channels, to which we have no objection, there needs to be a reining of the commercial activity and a cap put on this activity. Otherwise the rest of us will be out of business.
The law provides for fair competition. EU state aid rules are critical in this regard. They specify that RTE's public service remit must be properly defined, dealings between RTE's public service and commercial elements must be at arm's length, which does not happen, and RTE must not act anti-competitively. Here I would address the members of the RTE Authority. They have a duty and a responsibility as members of the authority to see that fairness exists and that they do not act anti-competitively with others. It would also be helpful if we could meet with RTE as an industry to discuss face to face our respective views.
We respect public service. Where does public service and commercial interface? Where does one begin and the other end? Let us take "The Late Late Show". I have no problem that it is a public service, that it is funded by licence fee and that it is sponsored. I do have problems, however, when RTE commercialises within the programme through raffles, audience participation, the "one for everyone in the audience" phenomenon and excessive commercial opportunities which are, in effect, advertising for those who supply those products. That is within the programme. That would not happen within a newspaper article. If it did, we would head it, "Advertising Feature". I could not imagine The Irish Times allowing Fintan O’Toole do those sorts of things. Apart from the fact that he would not do it, his editor would not allow him to either. There is an issue here.
Given that public service has been created, it needs to be defined and limits must be set on where it begins and ends in the commercial world. Are these newspapers any less public service? In terms of democratic debate and information, newspapers play an important role. Newspapers are under serious threat. Our advertising levels are back to 1998 levels. If one has an interest in the survival of Irish newspapers, this issue needs to be addressed urgently. We have a Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources whose remit does not include newspapers, only broadcasting. Everywhere else there is a minister for media, and culture is usually attached to it. For example, in Britain, there is a minister for culture, media and sport. Therefore, somebody has responsibility at political and official level for fair play and considering the knock-on effects between them. In this digital world, we need this fresh approach. It is timely given the situation in which we are politically and given what might happen in the future that someone would say that we should take a fresh approach to the media and consider the media in an integrated converged digital world. I will come back to RTE to reinforce this. Is dating, motors or otherwise a public service? If it is a public service, it should not be in these spaces.
I refer to RTE apps for free. RTE launched a mobile application. I cannot find any mention of mobile apps in legislation. I do not know where that can come from. What I can find in the legislation - I refer to the Broadcasting Act 2009 - is that if RTE wants to launch a new service, it must undertake a public value test and a sector impact assessment. No such public value test or sector impact assessment took place in the case of the mobile app and I would have to ask why. RTE is on record as saying it will not charge for its mobile app. No newspaper can make that statement because it could not do that for free. We are denied entry into that space, even though newspapers have mobile apps. They will not get any takers, however, because no one will pay for them. In addition, we must charge VAT at 21% on anything we do, which is another nonsense.
I refer to cross-promotion. RTE is in a privileged position of being on television, on radio, in print, online, on teletext, involved in events and so forth. It has a range of platforms. That is a unique privilege bestowed by this House. This House denies the rest of us entry into those spaces. We would not get a licence for television, for example. We are not allowed into those spaces. RTE should, therefore, respect those individual spaces and not cross-promote across all the spaces. RTE will say some of them are commercial. If it says the online website is commercial, why should a news presenter promote www.rte.ie? It should be a public service website. If it is a commercial website, why should Sean O’Rourke, a man for whom we have the highest respect, say to go to www.rte.ie? I could not imagine Fintan O’Toole saying in his column to go to the commercial arms of The Irish Times where one will get this, that or the other. That would not happen. There is a mix here that needs to be clarified. Someone in authority must do this.
If one looks at the RTE website, there are many case histories demonstrating how powerful it is. It can offer advertisers something no one else can offer them because the State has given it this privilege. It can do things across a range of platforms but I will not go into the detail.
We should stop and think again about the digital world and about when one wants to access information. There is a reluctance among people to pay for information these days, and it is growing. Anyone online expects information for free. Online is definitely impacting severely on our traditional newspaper sales and advertising revenues. I know we live in difficult economic times but let us set aside the difficulties of the country. We charge 13.5% which is the highest rate in Europe of the traditional established countries. I think Slovenia has a higher rate. Britain, from where a lot of media competition comes into this country, has a zero rate, as do Belgium, Denmark and Finland. France has a 2.1% rate. Where there is VAT, it is at a very marginal rate. These countries have these rates because they recognise reading should not be taxed, nor should culture, education and the democratic role of the newspaper. We need some enlightened thinking.
Many of our newspapers deliver an e-paper. One can get The Irish Times or the Irish Independent online but we must charge 21% VAT. There is a reluctance to pay for anything online but charging 21% destroys the chances of any success. One can keep the 21% and get no revenue. Both of those should be the same and it should be 5%. It would be easy to argue for zero and I should do so on the grounds that many other countries have a zero rate. It would not cost the State a huge sum of money if that were addressed but it would be of enormous assistance to the industry.
I refer to restrictions on advertising. Advertising is back to 1998 levels. We should not rush down the road of trying to restrict advertising further. We are very engaged in self-regulation of advertising and advertising codes. We are engaged with the Department of Health and Children and others in dealing with that and are acting responsibly. We have put in place a lot of different measures to better manage some of the excesses that might have been there in the past. We are taking a responsible attitude on issues such as the environment. We have a recycling rate which is up from 26% in 2002 to approximately 80% through a series of measures with which we have actively engaged. Advertising is our life blood and it is important we preserve it. It is under serious attack, so we should not add to that attack.
We lack a cohesive media policy. As I said, we have a Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources. His only concern with broadcasting in terms of the remit and the Department should be addressed. The Minister's role should embrace media. That is an important point for the House to address.
There is a lack of understanding which is demonstrated in the impact of media convergence. During the summer, on the day this House rose, we received a notice that on the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland website, which we are supposed to look at morning, noon and night, there was a proposal to extend the amount of time for broadcasting advertising on commercial television stations. We had ten days to respond to that. It happened on the day this House rose, so we could not raise it anywhere. We could not come to the House and say this madness should be stopped and an extension given to us. We could not get anyone of whom to ask questions or otherwise. This proposal on the BAI website was done on the basis that they had to compete with British television channels. We all compete with British everything in terms of media. It was a ludicrous proposition. There was no recognition of media pluralism or media diversity in Ireland or any idea of convergence or the knock-on effects. This was a daft idea in isolation. It showed the lack of policy. The framework is not there for media to be considered as a whole. I am not saying we have all the answers but someone needs to consider this in a more balanced and fair way. A fresh approach to the media should be the priority, which members should adopt. We live in a converged world. Let us have a Minister for the media.
I refer to securing the future for Irish newspapers. The committee should understand that we need support to embrace and exploit the digital opportunities. We are not dinosaurs. We are in the content business. Newspapers should be alive and well in the future but we will deliver content in the way the consumers want to receive it. A large part of that will be in print but they will also want it on a variety of tablets, mobiles, online and so forth. We need help from Government in that area. We met the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Innovation, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, yesterday and explained our position to him.
All Irish media need copyright protection to safeguard their creative materials. That will be very important in future, in particular given all the people who want to rip it off in this global world in which we live. We need proper implementation of the law and a fair competition framework. Irish law and EU state aid law are adequate to deal with this but it is not being dealt with properly. We want greater recognition of the public service role that newspapers play. We want some acknowledgement that we fulfil a public service role. Let us put it this way: we would be the poorer as a nation if there were no Irish newspapers. That is a risk which, I have to say, is real if we do not do something. I thank the Chairman. I am sorry for taking so long. I appreciate being given this opportunity.