Licence fee drop set to leave €61m hole, says minister
RTÉ is facing a €61million deficit from plummeting TV licence fee sales between this year and next, the Media Minister said.
The latest figures show revenue from the licence fee fell by another €1.3million last week, bringing total losses to date to €12.2million, with a projected loss of €21million by the end of 2023.
A further loss of €40million is expected next year if the trend continues. Minister Catherine Martin has insisted that RTÉ must implement stringent cost-cutting measures before additional funding is provided by Government. ‘Unfortunately, that €40million is still not going to be allocated in any shape
or form until we see that strategic vision and we’re happy with it,’ she said.
The minister said what the Government’s financial adviser for State bodies, New Era, had advised was that RTÉ ‘should do a job of work in relation to cost efficiencies and cost savings,’ to make up the €21million difference.
RTÉ was already on track to hit a €7m deficit this year, before the drop in licence fee revenues. At her department’s Budget press conference yesterday, Ms Martin said that RTÉ would be given €16million in interim funding to be delivered near the end of this year.
Ms Martin said the €16million was ‘more or less set in stone’ after the Future of Media Commission’s recommendation last year, and was not on foot of current controversies and financial issues at the national broadcaster.
She said that the Government will grant once it has seen that director general Kevin Bakhurst’s strategic reform plan was not a ‘box ticking exercise’.
Mr Bakhurst is expected to reveal the framework around his strategic vision at the end of this month and a full reform plan later this year.
‘We can’t just hand over money. We are just saying you need to save your strategic vision first,’ Ms Martin said.
‘I think it’s only fair and right after everything that’s transpired [that] we get to see a strategic vision first.’