TV licence fee and Pat Kenny.

flsghujslkuo

The best-known faces on Irish television are:

1. Pat Kenny: (Media Services Ltd) €786,240.
2. Gerry Ryan: (Balcom Management Ltd) €520,685.
3. Marian Finucane: (Montrose Services Ltd) €436,413.
4. Ryan Tubridy: (Trocity Productions Ltd) €328,000.
5. Joe Duffy: (Claddaghgreen Ltd) €268,200.
6. Miriam O’Callaghan: (Baby Blue Productions Ltd) €218,272.
7. Derek Mooney: €204,946.
8. John Kelly: €202,000.
9. Tommie Gorman: €200,367.
10. Charlie Bird: €184,537.


In all fairness how can anyone justify that Pat Kenny gets 5000 licence fees per year. Another Joke is Marian Finucane... I would love to get 450K for speaking maybe three to four hours a week on a crappy radio station.

Why can't people who pay these salaries i.e. the irish people decide who and how much Radio presenters are paid.

I must note that I have no problem with tommie gorman or charlie bird getting paid 200k. Let RTE pay these people off advertising only and let the licence fees pay for people who actually do work: I wonder how much Pat kenny's assistant, who probably does all the work get paid... 30-40K. RTE bucking tankers!!

Would anyone care if Pat kenny or Marian Finucane weren't on the radio or tv tomorrow. IMO NO! maybe some old biddy in Mayo might care...

Ok, that's enough ranting. in short RTE radio should not get tv licence money to pay presenters... let the advertising generated during the shows pay for it.

DMC

flsghujslkuo wrote:

maybe some old biddy in Mayo might care...

And she pays a TV licence too. :rolleyes:

mike65

Its not a TV licence its a tv and radio licence, its just that you dont need a licence for the radio only!

Mike.

flsghujslkuo

We are a small country and it should be a case of supply and demand....

Why are they paid so much... it's not like they are irreplaceable.

They all should get minimum wage for doing a job that any DJ working for a 'private radio station' would does for 1/1000 of the cost, perhaps even better. No wonder RTE are losing their audience when they spend all our money on idiots like them, Charlie Bird and Tommie Gorman excluded

monkeyfudge

I seem to remember reading once that Jeremy Paxman gets paid £80,000 a year on the BBC and license payers were complaining about the high wage.

It is frustrating to think that someone as competent as him is being paid so much less than the people we get on RTÉ.

mike65

80,000 for Paxo on Newsnight makes sense, 15 million for Jonathon Ross on Friday night makes no sense. Makes Kenny look pretty cheap.

Mike.

FlutterinBantam

I was listening to an interview of Gay Byrne by Dunphy some time ago.

Looks like all this shyte started when Byrne, RTE's poster boy at the time got a big offer to go to the States, from Westinghouse I think.

RTE panicked and offered to match the U.S. offer and the whole thing "grew wings"

In other words the No.2 man Mike Murphy at the time got his dosh bumped up and so down along the line.

Obviously the heads out in RTE rode the arse off the licence payer and the end result is what we have today, a good solid service but costing ,in my opinion , way way too much ,for the audience reached.

The punters mentioned by the OP in my opinion are getting far more than they should and I would love to get a comparison with a local radio station in the UK with a similar audience base to get a comparison.
I realise the Public Service broadcasting tag is added expense but nobody will convince me that Marian Finucane is worth that salary based on output.:mad:

Nightwish

Doesn't 2FM pay for itself in advertising revenue? My tax isn't paying for the 2 goons on the Breakfast Show...I hope!

DMC

2FM is self sufficient in advertising alone, its a net contributor to the RTÉ cake. So, by that reckoning, Gerry Ryan doesn't cost the licence fee payer anything (unless its something on TV).

How Finucane can justify that wage for 4 hours a week, and, it appears, getting the same time off she used to get when she did 5 hours a week Mon-Fri, is beyond challenging.

My only thought on all of this is.... they are big names in a small pond. I wonder, given Ryan's wage.. does everyone in that top 10 get revenue from advertising that's in excess of their salary? I would say in that Top 10, five of them would "pay their own way", i.e. get their income solely out of advertising on their programmes, TV and radio. The ones I reckon wouldn't would be all the news people, John Kelly and Marian Finucane.

Genghis

Lads, those figures are for 2005. So, Finucanes salary, for example would be for when she was on 5 days a week, Tubridy for his Full Irish, etc.

I don't necessarily object to the high level of salary - Kenny, for example is on the radio 5 days a week, and TV once a week. His Friday runs from something like 6am until 1am; his normal workday is 6am to 4 or 5pm. Its a high-pressure, spotlight position, and his salary is probably low compared to people at the top of other professions (there are many accountants, business managers, solicitors, doctors, dentists and others earning more than that I am sure).

I am not a fan of Kenny, but he does produce listenership and viewership figures, and his shows are probably net-contributers (similar to 2FM). As you move down the list, the salaries drop off sharply - Charlie Bird, for example is probably on the low side - how much would a news editor in a national paper earn?

Linking it to the number of TV licences is ridiculous tabloid / Irish independent and plain nonsense.

flsghujslkuo

I don't think the listener figures for RTE have anything to do with the DJs, it has more to do with the pragrammes on the station: anyone who is half decent could replace the likes of Pat Kenny and no one would care, therefore the salary should reflect that. I don't think that anyone who works 3-4 hours a week deserves half a million Euro... yet alone when our TV licence pays for it... I can think of many more places that that licence fee could be spent on.

DMC

Genghis wrote:

Linking it to the number of TV licences is ridiculous tabloid / Irish independent and plain nonsense.

There has always been an agenda against RTÉ by Independent Newspapers, since day one, and more so since the mid-80's when Sir A.J.F. O'Reilly & co. were trying to get into commercial TV and radio here. They revel in dropping figures, in titbits about their salaries etc.

DMC

flsghujslkuo wrote:

I don't think the listener figures for RTE have anything to do with the DJs, it has more to do with the pragrammes on the station:

It's a bit of both. Decent presenters make for decent radio. Pat Kenny's morning radio programme is light years apart from the Late Late Show. His radio show better suits his capability.

flsghujslkuo wrote:

I can think of many more places that that licence fee could be spent on.

I'd like to here what you'd suggest. Who would you replace, and with whom? People can knock presenters (overpaid or not) but the key is, are they any better?

DublinWriter

flsghujslkuo wrote:

We are a small country and it should be a case of supply and demand....

Why are they paid so much... it's not like they are irreplaceable.

You kind of answered your own question there.

Yes, we are a small country, and therefore have quite a limited pool of 'talent' to draw from.

I'd imagine the management thinking at RTE is pretty conservative and Civil-Serivice-esque. They don't take risks and don't want to screw around with the all-holy advertising revenue, so they'll stick with the same faces for decades in order not to rock the boat.

The percentage of broadcasters over the age of 50 must be about 90% on Radio 1.

Feck sake, they even still pay Gay Byrne not to work for anyone else!

DublinWriter

DMC wrote:

I'd like to here what you'd suggest. Who would you replace, and with whom? People can knock presenters (overpaid or not) but the key is, are they any better?

Well that's the thing, isn't it? RTE aren't exactly known for bringing new talent up the ranks and are too lazy and conservative in that they'll always take the route of least commercial risk and resistance.

copacetic

DublinWriter wrote:

I'd imagine the management thinking at RTE is pretty conservative and Civil-Serivice-esque.

They don't take risks and don't want to screw around with the all-holy advertising revenue, so they'll stick with the same faces for decades in order not to rock the boat.

First part is wrong, second part I guess is right. RTÉ is run as a business unlike the civil service, in fact it is much closer to a private sector mentality than any other public body. They have the license fee and advertising revenue and need both to provide the service they are expected to. They are equally as important. When you look at Pat Kennys wages etc, it doesn't matter if your average boardsie thinks he isn't worth the money. The money his shows bring to RTÉ ad revenue is massive, he knows it and they know it hence his salary. Stick some nobody in there instead at 100k a year and you save 700k in salary and lose 10 or 11 million in ad buy? Doesn't make any sense.
Finances are incredibly strictly controlled at RTE, when you have the ex-Ryanair CEO as the CFO you can imagine how controlled everything must be. They work these things out and don't throw money at the talent for no reason. For instance costs haven't gone up in the last year, which means in reality they have come down. When all other public bodies costs are rocketing I think you can make the case that this is excellent management?
It's nothing like the civil service where the money just keeps on coming unless it gets into the papers, RTEs finances are carefully controlled and transparent , made public and audited every year. If we did the same with the other public bodies it would be interesting reading!

JoeFitz89

yes why are people paying so much for so much trash the licence fee should be at least reduced significantly!

replytohere2004

monkeyfudge wrote:

I seem to remember reading once that Jeremy Paxman gets paid £80,000 a year on the BBC and license payers were complaining about the high wage.

It is frustrating to think that someone as competent as him is being paid so much less than the people we get on RTÉ.

Pakman get over 1.2million for Newsnight.

From Wikipedia

In April 2006 it was claimed by The Sun newspaper that he earned €1,200,000 (£800,000) for his Newsnight presenting and €352,000 (£240,000) for presenting University Challenge, making his putative total yearly salary €1,527,000 (£1,040,000). This revelation was one of a series of BBC salary leaks reported in the British tabloid press that sparked an investigation by the BBC.[6]

Big Tone

Lets put this into some perspective, all those presenters are "self-employed" as far as RTE are concerned they are outside contractors, not directly employed by RTE, their salary is in gross so they pay 42% on anything over €31,000 approx.
What they do to write off tax and get VAT returns is their own business but their salaries are a reflection of what they can earn in advertising revenue for RTE so take Pat Kenny, RTE's single biggest money spinner with his radio show and Late Late Show revenues combined, his salary comes to a fraction of that earned by combined advertising revenue generated.
Yes the salaries seem exorbant but relative to earning power they are modest, however they can thank Oliver Barry forcing RTE to be like that, he tried, unsuccessfully, to lure Gay Byrne to Century 100 in 1989 for a six figure sum. RTE met Barry's figure and lumped more perks for "uncle Gaybo" on top and so the benefits of these type of contracts are permeated down to todays "Stars" so they wont be poached by the deep pockets of Denis O Brien, Today FM etc

medja

Big Tone wrote:

their salaries are a reflection of what they can earn in advertising revenue for RTE so take Pat Kenny, RTE's single biggest money spinner with his radio show and Late Late Show revenues combined, his salary comes to a fraction of that earned by combined advertising revenue generated.
Yes the salaries seem exorbant but relative to earning power they are modest,

If you put on anyone else from 10-12 on radio 1 they'd still get most of the audience that Kenny draws in. His share of listeners has fallen through the floor over the last 10 years, he's probably getting only half his 1997 audience.

If you put on someone fresh at half the price they'd be far more likely to earn just as much ad revenue if not a lot more. There is no proof that Kenny brings in the audience on the Late Late. As no one else has gotten the chance to present the Late Late other than Gay.

On the radio show he's not around for 3 to 4 months of the year and the listenership stays the same (it might even go up!)