Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 2 February 2022
44. Deputy Mattie McGrath asked the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media the number of television licences that have not been paid; the number of legal proceedings initiated by An Post in the past two years; the number of persons charged for non-payment of a television licence; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [5283/22]
View answerAn Post act as issuing agent for TV Licence fee collection. The estimated TV Licence evasion rate is 15.2% and while An Post make every effort to bring TV Licence evaders into the licensed pool, a considerable amount of time and resources are spent in dealing with this issue, with prosecution of evaders being a last resort.
Details of legal proceedings initiated by An Post for non-payment of TV Licences in 2020 and 2021 are detailed in the table below.
TV Licence Legal Proceedings 2020 and 2021
|
Year |
Number of Summons applied for |
Number of cases brought to court |
|
2020 |
9,555 |
4,581*[1] |
|
2021 |
7,507 |
4,328 |
*The number of cases heard in 2020 does not include 902 cases that were adjourned as Dublin court cases are heard at standalone court sittings and Court Services decided to adjourn all TV Licence cases as they were deemed to be not on the essential list. These cases were adjourned and most were heard in July 2021.
Prosecution for non-payment of TV licences is a matter for the Courts Service. Where a fine is imposed, this is collected by An Garda Síochána. Statistics of fines imposed and non-payment of fines are not provided to An Post or my Department.
