Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 24 February 2004
152 Ms Burton asked the Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources the reasons RTE was not granted an increase in the licence fee in line with inflation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [5815/04]
View answerThe Deputy should be aware that the €2 increase in the licence fee approved by me last year, taken together with the increase in the households that should have licences, should result in RTE licence fee revenue growing at more than the rate of inflation in 2004. The Government decision of December 2002, which provided for a substantial increase in the television licence fee, also introduced a new mechanism for determining the future level of the licence fee. The Government decision provided for an annual adjustment of the television licence fee, using a consumer price index minus X formula where X is determined by an external evaluation of RTE's compliance with its statement of commitments and its change management agenda, to take account of rising costs, but also to reflect RTE's performance on execution of change management and programme commitments. My decision to grant RTE an increase of €2 in the licence fee was informed by the report of an independent evaluation of RTE's performance in 2003, that was undertaken by PricewaterhouseCoopers. A copy of this report is available on my Department's website. The decision to increase the television licence fee by €2 took account of the findings in that report that RTE had achieved a significant amount in 2003, particularly with respect to delivery of programme output, near achievement of its budget target, and implementation of accountability and transparency measures, and while recognising that many changes had taken place, in RTE, the implementation of its change programme has not been as successful as planned.
