Licence fee fund for BCI stations

[Mike]

How will this work in practice and what criteria will be used to determine how much individual stations deserve ?

[The Real Stuttering John]

they can dip into a €7 million fund as can RTE and tv3, basically any broadcasting company or co-op but this fund is for things like arts, history, speech and drama and other things people don't want on the radio in general so it is kind of a bribe stations can take in a round about way to pump out shite !!!!!!

Interseting discussuion on this whole issue on Today FM the other night with Willie o'Reilly, Bob Collins and the bloke from DCU who allegedly is a lecturer whose name always escapes me all in discussions with Fintan O'Toole on the LAST WORD. The classic line of the debate came from Fintan who put it to Willie that "local COMMERCIAL stations don't do enough PUBLIC SERVICE broadcasting" If I hear that again from anybody I will thump them hard!!!!

[DeargDoom]

Interesting to point out that TV3 already have said that they didn't want a share of the licence fee - they simply wanted to prevent RTE using tax payers money to compete against private competition. I also recall Uncle Denis O Brien saying pretty much the same thing in 1990 when Ray Burke was battering RTE

[Peadar]

I disagree with this fund in it's present form. It's not clearly defined exactly who may use it and for what purpose.

It's bizarre that a commercial station can use this fund when they've chosen to be a commercial station funded by advertising for the purpose of making profit. The commercials have made their bed - let them now lie in it. I don't want my money funding Today FM, 98FM, 104, Spin etc. because they are being amply funded by commercial advertising and making a decent profit. That's not to say that any station in distress shouldn't be helped out - it should. We might even have saved Atlantic252 if that fund had existed (and hadn't been needlessly wasted.)

People will say "doesn't RTE broadcast ads"? Well it does, whether it should or not is another matter. Personally i think not, but given the small size of the licence fee paying population compared to the UK's 10million or so it's not surprising that they have to.

I think basically the licence fee increase wasn't justified - but it happenned anyway so we're gonna have to live with that. But why this pot-of-gold job for all the radio stations? I very much doubt that local stations like DSCR etc. will see very much of it.

[JamesDeane]

I resent the comment by many people that the new fund will be great for local radio and will finally bring public service broadcasting to the local airwaves.

When have you ever heard talk of the county development plan for a specific area on RTE Radio, where else would you get the latest on the club committee than local radio.

From breast feeding to community drama, to local issues and coverage of local authority meetings local radio has proved itself to be the finest public service broadcaster in Ireland.

Can the fund be used to assist with costs incurred for covering matters such as council meeitngs or minority sports as we all in local radio do on a weekly basis?

[Peadar]

I really like your last point.... I don't know where you're from, but try and find a club-level GAA or even soccer match live on Dublin Radio Stations and you're going to be heading for trouble. Anytime i've been outside the Pale i've always noticed how well presented the local stations are and how wide their programming is, compared to the greater Dublin area.

Leaving pirate radio aside (yes as people well know my 3 favourite stations are pirates but this discussion's about legal) we're left with Today FM, which to be fair does do a fair bit of live sport, and RTE. Both of these are national stations so you're not going to hear much below inter-county level games on them.

[DeargDoom]

yeah, but why should the commercial ILR Stations be forced to carry this stuff? My fear is now that ILR will be expected to turn out even more lost cause radio than it currently does.



btw, Anna Livia and Near FM both carry live sports coverage from local games in the Dublin area.

[The Real Stuttering John]

yes I'm with deargdoom all the way on this. LEAVE the COMMERCIAL stations alone and in return Public service radio should not be forced to become commercial......eh yeah I think that is what I mean!!!!! Why should the Dublin "MUSIC" stations be forced or expected to air live sports games etc.

Peadar if you want to listen to live coverage of a local GAA game tune to a local commuinty station or go to newstalk where they have extensive nightly coverage of sport. Let the music stations play the music. God knows there is little enough music on the music stations as it is. Next thing I know people will be demanding 98fm pump out Mass on a Sunday morning while 104 are forced to air the top 40 Irish language hits (featuring fiddles) of the week!!!! Surely you don't expect to walk into an Italian restraunt and be served Chinese food?