Gareth O'Callaghan: Fear and loathing as RTÉ comes close to running on empty
Ryan Tubridy announced this week he is joining Virgin Radio UK. RTÉ'S chronic financial problems have really only started to come to the surface since the Tubridy payment scandal broke.
“On some nights, I still believe that a car with the gas needle on empty can run fifty more miles if you have the right music very loud on the radio,” journalist Hunter S Thompson once said.
Right now, it feels as though RTÉ’s gas needle has been on empty for years. It’s still running thankfully, but for how much longer in the style we’ve known it for much of our lives? For those of us who were reared on a diet of Irish radio and television, it’s difficult to imagine a world without RTÉ in it; but as the year comes to a close, that once unlikely notion is becoming a possibility.
In less than four months, up to the middle of October, RTÉ’s licence revenue — its primary source of income — dropped by 31% from last year. The reason, as we now know, is because a third of those who purchased the annual licence last year refused to do so this year; and they don’t appear to want to change their minds.
Such loss is unsustainable if it worsens. Unless someone can devise a plan to prevent further loss, this week’s additional funding from Government of €56m will be gone in 12 months, while the money lost to date will never be recovered.
For those who might think that RTÉ has at last found a cork to shove back into the neck of the bottle, the broadcaster’s chronic financial problems have really only started to come to the surface since the Ryan Tubridy payment scandal broke.
RTÉ’s problem is that it’s spending more than it’s making. Simple as.
So far this year, as of October 16, RTÉ’s licence revenue has seen a drop of €12.6m compared to the same time as last year. Media Minister Catherine Martin stated in October that “it is further estimated that the loss of income to RTÉ to year-end will be up to €21m”.
The mood among RTÉ staff in the wake of the bailout confirmation this week is both united in its support, but divided in its sentiments. According to one source who spoke to me, there’s a sense of relief that some form of a financial lifeboat has at last arrived, while frustration, even anger, is rife because no one seems to know what the €56m will be spent on. Nor is it a lumpsum handout.
Next week RTÉ will be given €16m, with a further €20m in January; but the final portion will only be made available subject to strict terms and conditions that little seems to be known about so far. So basically, RTÉ is still broke and will remain so until a new income generator can be figured out and put in place.
Workers want to know exactly what this funding will be used for, who will be accountable for deciding what it is spent on, and, above all else, what the future holds in terms of the hemorrhaging licence fee.
My source, a senior producer of many years, believes that some form of conversation must have been held between senior RTÉ management and the minister’s advisers in order for the bailout amount to have been decided on, but sufficient details of what was discussed have not been made available to staff — the same people who are holding the place together. They feel left out in the cold. He said there’s now a huge level of distrust among staff as to what they believe they’re not being told by their bosses.
“There’s talk of shrinking RTÉ. It’s depressing trying to concentrate on forward planning for heavy-duty radio and television shows when you’re afraid to plan ahead for your own future. That’s morally unacceptable,” he said. “Some younger staff are afraid to book holidays in case their jobs are gone when they get back.”
Another RTÉ worker, a single mother, said unfair and hurtful comments had been directed at her recently by two other mothers while she was dropping her child off at a local creche. It wasn’t the first time, she said. It’s as though she’s being blamed for the eye-watering amounts of money paid to the celebrity presenters.
She said she has no choice but to buy the licence, which she can barely afford, as to not do so, she understands, might be a sackable offence. She’s not alone.
This week, Bakhurst announced that from now on no one working for the broadcaster will be paid more than €250,000 per year.
There are less than ten presenters paid more than that in RTÉ, all household names. However, he backtracked recently on his decision to disclose the salaries of RTÉ’s 100 highest earners, which, according to a source, was another “slap in the face” for staff who wanted those earners named.
Foremost for staff is their concern that this bailout might be spent on redundancies. Will the redundancies be voluntary? If not, the unions will roll up their sleeves. They have made this quite clear. Strike action is now a topic of discussion in some RTÉ circles.
I can still recall January 1992 when almost 1,600 RTÉ workers went on strike over staffing levels, when two-person camera crews were introduced without the agreement of SIPTU. I was on that picket line.
For almost a month, all live home-produced shows on RTÉ One and Network 2 were axed, with both channels filling schedules with large amounts of imported programming and archive material from BBC, ITV, Channel 4, the USA and Australia, along with films. News output on television was reduced to short bulletins, read by senior managers. Radio 1 featured back-to-back music programmes, also presented by non-union members.
The strike ended on February 17 when a resolution was reached between the unions and RTÉ management. It was later revealed that many listeners and viewers had phoned and written to the broadcaster, complimenting it on its radio and television output during the strike, with some even asking why it couldn’t be left that way.
The general mood among staff following the resolution of the strike was very hostile. Friendships ended, and some individuals refused to work with their bosses, while relationships between staff and some of the non-union managers became untenable.
Strikes, no matter how long they last, or how effective we’re led to believe their outcomes may be, tend to leave a lasting smell in their wake. While I doubt the notion of a strike at RTÉ would find much public support today, unions will always regard it as a final option.
Ireland faces a general election in the next fifteen months. RTÉ has always been seen as the final piece in the media jigsaw in the run-up to polling day.
Despite the competition from Virgin Media, it’s still compulsory in the minds of politicians to get their faces in front of the RTÉ cameras. A few minutes of live television in the days before polling is worth more than a thousand smiling posters.
Additional funding for the cash-strapped broadcaster is as much an incentive of support as it is a gesture of goodwill from the government to RTÉ, crucial when it comes to keeping the relationship amicable as both local and general elections get closer.
A compulsory media charge could damage as much as boost the hopes of any politician hoping to be elected, depending on whether they show support for it or not. There aren’t many TDs endeared to a media charge, while most agree that the licence fee is dead in the water. So where to from here?
As one politician said to me this week, a media charge would be worse than the water meter fiasco. “We’ve seen what happens when you force people to pay for something they won’t tolerate,” he added.
RTÉ is now in checkmate. Shrinking its extravagant output is its only way out of debt. It needs to be reminded of what it has excelled at over the years, and to concentrate on that strength.
It also needs government support if it is to survive, but the Government knows that how it handles the broadcaster’s financial crisis will also influence voters — both those who love its output and those who don’t.
How this pans out is anyone’s guess; that’s if a realistic and reasonable solution can be found. However, history has shown us that what is realistic for some can be far from reasonable for others.
