15k stop TV licence fee after broadcaster fuss
BY LOUISE BURNE Political Correspondent MORE than 15,300 people cancelled their TV licence direct debits last year following six months of scandal at RTE.
Figures provided by Media Minister Catherine Martin show that in July, weeks after the station started hitting the headlines, 2,327 people stopped their monthly payments.
The national broadcaster was plunged into controversy in June 2023 when it was revealed former Late Late Show presenter Ryan Tubridy had been overpaid by €345,000 over five years.
Subsequent Oireachtas Committee hearings with the broadcaster also revealed the use of barter accounts and exuberant spending on items such as flip flops as well as the failure of Toy Show the Musical.
The fallout from the scandal resulted in the number of people paying the TV licence falling off a cliff, leaving a hole of nearly €20million.
Ms Martin has confirmed 15,359 people cancelled their direct debits in 2023.
This was up 43% compared to the 10,731 who cancelled in 2022.
Of the direct debits for TV licences cancelled in 2023, 8,461 were stopped from July onwards. In July, 2,327 direct debits were cancelled, compared to just 1,008 that were annulled in the same month in 2022.
In August, cancellations jumped from 806 to 1,632 in the space of a year.
Ms Martin told Sinn Fein TD Thomas Gould in response to a parliamentary question that An Post stated there are “a number of reasons why a direct debit arrangement is revoked or cancelled”.
She added: “A licence holder may change banks, for example, and this can be seen in the spike in direct debit cancellations from April
2022 to March 2023.
“In addition, a licence holder may have become eligible for a ‘free’ licence under the Household Benefits Package, administered by the Department of Social Protection.
“A licence holder may decide to move from direct debit payments to online purchasing or another payment channel.
“As mentioned previously, direct debit payments are trending upwards but online purchases are growing even more strongly, moving from 26.61% of purchases in 2012 to 45.20% of purchases in 2022.”