Vol. 397 No. 9
16 Mr. Gilmore asked the Minister for Communications the bodies or organisations from which he has received representations that the amount of advertising broadcast by RTÉ should be reduced; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
18 Mr. McCartan asked the Minister for Communications if it is intended to curb the amount of advertising which RTÉ may broadcast; if it is intended to compensate RTÉ for the revenue lost from this development in order that programme quality will not deteriorate; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
214 Mr. Barry asked the Minister for Communications if he will explain the meaning of the term "level pitch" between RTÉ and their competitors.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 16, 18 and 214 together.
Representations have been made by various interests regarding perceived distortion in the advertising market.
This distortion arises from the dominant position of RTÉ which exists due to the privileged monopoly position they enjoyed for many years, the lead time they had in that protected environment to develop their services, the substantial resources at their disposal, with particular reference to their access to licence fees.
I am sympathetic to the arguments put forward in these representations and propose to bring forward shortly legislative measures which, I believe, will result in a fairer, competitive environment to all concerned and should not result in any deterioration in RTÉ programme standards.
Will the Minister be more specific in identifying the various interests who have made representations to him on this?
For example, the national newspapers of Ireland as far back as 1985 made representations. The Deputy will be aware of the volume of articles that appeared in the newspapers, in particular a couple of months back, on this whole question of access to the advertising revenue, the licence fee and the dominant position of RTÉ.
Is the Minister suggesting that the newspapers were the only interests who made representations on this issue?
They made representations as a group. When I toured the country opening radio stations and so on I had talks with the people involved in the electronic and print media and the Deputy will be aware that articles have appeared in various newspapers on this issue.
In regard to the suggestion by the Minister that one of the grounds on which he is sympathetic to the representations made to him is that RTÉ enjoy a monopoly position, I should like to ask him if he is aware that according to plans at least one organisation will not exist very much longer. Will the Minister agree that this is an inopportune time to be talking about challenging the revenue base of RTÉ in view of the fact that shortly they will be in competition with another commercial TV station?
No.
Will the Minister agree that RTÉ have a dominant position arising from the fact that they were the only legal station broadcasting up to the time we passed legislation?
Yes, and it is a pity that others did not take this issue on board and bring forward the necessary legislation when they had the opportunity to regularise the licensing of radio stations and put the pirates off the air. They should not have waited for us to do so.
I am calling on Deputy Sherlock to put the next supplementary question. I have given Deputy McCartan a lot of leeway on this question.
I wish to ask a further question.
I will allow a brief question as the Deputy has already asked a series of questions.
Does the Minister intend levelling the pitch to such an extent that a concert orchestra, a symphony orchestra and the other many social services which RTÉ as a national broadcasting agency operate will be maintained?
The Deputy will have to await the details of the legislation but he should consider the fact that RTÉ are in receipt of licence fees to the extent of £50 million which should cover a couple of orchestras.
We now come to Deputy Sherlock's question.
