Dee Forbes banging the RTE TV licence drum again 60m uncollected fee *poll not working - pl ignore*

kneemos

TallGlass wrote: »

Thought so, I think the loophole is the staff are contractors or something is it?

Is there an overall figure for the production cost of Fair City so we can gauge how much the actors may get.

Over eleven million per year.

Presumably it sells ads and makes a net profit.

https://www.her.ie/entertainment/yikes-the-cost-per-episode-of-rtes-fair-city-has-been-revealed-268192

Sir Oxman

Bowlardo wrote: »

“OVER 8,000 EXTRA households bought a TV licence in 2017. The latest figures show that the total TV Licence sales for 2017 were 1,027,596 – an increase of 8,427 from 2016.“
So about 164 million in Tv license fees and over 150 million in advertising.
So well over 300 million coming it.
How are they in trouble and how is the content so poor.

Top 10 RTE presenter salaries in 2015:

10. Darragh Moloney €188,803 (not in 2014 figures)

9. Bryan Dobson - €195,913 (€195,816 in 2014)

8. Nicky Byrne €200,583 (not in 2014 figures)

7. Claire Byrne €201,500 (not in 2014 figures)

6. Sean O'Rourke - €290,113 (€290,096 in 2014)

5. Marian Finucane - €295,000 (€295,000 in 2014)

4. Miriam O'Callaghan - €299,000 (€280,445 in 2014)

3. Joe Duffy - €389,988 (€416,893 in 2014)

2. Ray D'Arcy €400,000 (not in 2014 figures)

1. Ryan Tubridy €495,000 (€495,000 in 2014)

Jaysus to all but mainly the underlined.
How?

suicide_circus

according to wiki 550,000 people per week watch fair city. I can only presume it's some kind of depraved masochism.

TallGlass

261 weekdays in 2018 so same episodes a year is my maths right here, that's 42k an episode?

kneemos

TallGlass wrote: »

Thought so, I think the loophole is the staff are contractors or something is it?

Is there an overall figure for the production cost of Fair City so we can gauge how much the actors may get.

The actors get €460 per day. The writers are surprisingly well paid also considering.

http://vipmagazine.ie/youll-never-guess-how-much-money-the-stars-of-fair-city-make-per-episode/

suicide_circus

Sir Oxman wrote: »

Jaysus to all but mainly the underlined.
How?

right place right time, certainly nothing to do with talent or likability

TallGlass

kneemos wrote: »

The actors get €460 per day. The writers are surprisingly well paid also considering.

http://vipmagazine.ie/youll-never-guess-how-much-money-the-stars-of-fair-city-make-per-episode/

Well in that case the main actors who feature regular are in the 120k salary range.

OU812

kneemos wrote: »

The actors get €460 per day. The writers are surprisingly well paid also considering.

http://vipmagazine.ie/youll-never-guess-how-much-money-the-stars-of-fair-city-make-per-episode/

That’s not a lot for a daily rate when you consider daily rates in other industries.

Some of the people I work with are on between 1.5 & 2 x that with a minimum days guarantee.

True, they don’t get taxis on top. Or get invited to first nights in the theatre, so I guess it all balances out

TallGlass

OU812 wrote: »

That’s not a lot for a daily rate when you consider daily rates in other industries.

Some of the people I work with are on between 1.5 & 2 x that with a minimum days guarantee.

True, they don’t get taxis on top. Or get invited to first nights in the theatre, so I guess it all balances out

Well, you need to be performing or you'll get the boot, Fair City is mediocre at best, if it was any good the BBC, ITV, C4 would be relaying it into the UK like RTE/Virgin do.

ButtersSuki

Graniteville wrote: »

Because you have no clue?

Ask an accountant - they'll tell you how ridiculous your comment is

Nice tone there.

I notice you haven’t produced a source for your €2.5m claim. Do you have one?

As for my knowledge of accountancy practices, I made a topline comment without going into the minutiae of the actual practices at hand for the sake of not boring threadreaders to death. Are you suggesting the opposite perhaps...that Duffy et al establish these one man companies to pay more tax?

AbusesToilets

TallGlass wrote: »

Overall I like RTE to be honest, however I would rather see it radical overhauled or 'scrapped' in the sense that it's broken down and rebuilt. It's financial situation is ridiculous, so bad that each household with a TV is bailing it out to the tune of nearly 180€ a year.

I would actually say, the licence fee needs to be reduced gradually and RTE made more accountable for there actions and making themselves competitive. The fee will never be removed and I don't think it should be removed fully to keep it somewhat independent (in theory).

But in typical Ireland style any major corp that pheks up is given a bailout at the taxpayers expense.

I quite the concept myself, but they've been on a decline for good while. THe sports department in particular is in a terrible state. Basically lost the rights everything outside of the GAA. It's a shambles.

fritzelly

RTE is still living in the 80's
All foreign content they show has already been broadcast on other channels that pretty much everyone has access to. I know charges are based on your overall viewership for things like films/series etc but why even bother paying for this stuff when there is a very good chance it was already seen on BBC or ITV etc months beforehand. Llkes of Eastenders etc - total waste of money. Maybe they will make up excuses of "but 100's of thousands watch it on RTE", reality they would still watch it on the other channels. Complete waste of money. And lets not forget all the other crap reality programs they are paying a fortune in royalties to replicate over here.
VM produce similar quality programming for a fraction of the price and without any subsidies and still manage somehow to be profitable!

pnecilcaser

BBC doesn't have advertisements every fifteen minutes and has high quality programming.

Also I'm not paying for a broadcaster who doesn't have the balls to axe the Angelus and just replaces it with Angelus Lite Sponsored by Your Yoga-Loving Inner Spirit which still proclaims it's affiliation to the church on ever census even though you don't go to mass.

steddyeddy

Graniteville wrote: »

Have a look at the programmes all of those people present and loom at the advertising revenue around those programmes. The Late late Toy show brings in well over 500k in sponsorship and advertising and even taking the production budget out, it gives a net profit of over 200k for that three hour slot.

D'Arcy and Duffy are two is just can't listen to or watch, but there are hundreds of thousands that do and again advertising and sponsorship ensure a very decent profit.

Live sports, esp GAA (excl the big matches) are big loss making programmes, but are essential for the mix. Similarly documentaries and programmes such as primetime require funding, but are essential too.

Its funny how everyone that complains about the licence only ever bring up the programmes that make strong profits?

If the profits are so strong why are RTE always asking for handouts from the public?

decky1

seen a guy from england on you tube who has'nt paid license in 4/5 years , does'nt watch tv and got a weaver form filled it in and no one seems to bother him would'nt it be great if we could do it here, he also commented on the famous ' Detector Van' he claims there is noting in the world of science that can detect if your watching tele from a passing van.

smurgen

Won’t be paying.my dad done a few hours inside over not paying his last year.will do the same route. Means sweet f all and they don’t deserve it.

sdanseo

smurgen wrote: »

Won’t be paying.my dad done a few hours inside over not paying his last year.will do the same route. Means sweet f all and they don’t deserve it.

This isn't the answer either though. If everyone ignored the law society would fall apart and we might as well live on an island with no laws at all.

The ballot box is the way to change things.

Failing that, raising the profile of an issue by means of mass social media campaigns or protest (which isn't pleasant either, especially the way some of the water protesters behaved) - but ultimately it got the result they wanted.

Graniteville

steddyeddy wrote: »

If the profits are so strong why are RTE always asking for handouts from the public?

Most programming is loss making. But the programming of the top earners is not.

I'd prefer an increase in advertising to 8min and no increase in license fee

fritzelly

Graniteville wrote: »

I'd prefer an increase in advertising to 8min and no increase in license fee

Where's all this advertising going to come from?

Beyond the scope of their commitments as the national subsidised broadcaster any program losing money should be scrapped

ButtersSuki

Graniteville wrote: »

Most programming is loss making. But the programming of the top earners is not.

I'd prefer an increase in advertising to 8min and no increase in license fee

Hi, just wondering if you're going to provide the source for your €2.5m in advertising revenue figure for Liveline?

Billy86

pnecilcaser wrote: »

BBC doesn't have advertisements every fifteen minutes and has high quality programming.

They do also have a far, far larger population to draw from than us - but provide a far wider range of channels and other outlets, and when you go to some of their "lesser" stations, it's clear as day that they really are trying to get that budget to stretch as far as possible in all directions (in that a lot of the stuff is utter crap and even looks very cheap, but it's clearly made domestically to help the industry as a whole and young people in it to get the ball rolling on their careers).

I'm fine with RTE making crap, so long as it's cheap and with a purpose like that (as well as the fact that it promotes Irish jobs, from actors to set design, make up, props, lighting, catering, and on and on). And along the way they'll discover some gems and come out with serious talent as well. If they had that setup 25 years ago Graeme Linehan and his comedy show about priests he was working on would have been a lot more likely to fall on their laps, for the most obvious example... instead he didn't even bother and went direct to the UK.

Thing is, every single person reading this thread knows that this will never happen. At the very least for it to even be a remote possibility, RTE would have to be torn down to the absolute foundations and built back up from scratch... and yes, in a better suited location at that!

Billy86

sdanseo wrote: »

The ballot box is the way to change things.

Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any politicians (certainly on the non-loony variety) who have any interest at all in doing a think about RTE. Maybe I've completely missed those who are when they have brought it up, but it's just not something I've seen given any real attention to whatsoever.

sligojoek

Billy86 wrote: »

Thing is, every single person reading this thread knows that this will never happen. At the very least for it to even be a remote possibility, RTE would have to be torn down to the absolute foundations and built back up from scratch... and yes, in a better suited location at that!

Not just RTE. It's the whole country.. A new location would be nice too. For the whole country, I mean.

theguzman

pnecilcaser wrote: »

BBC doesn't have advertisements every fifteen minutes and has high quality programming.

Also I'm not paying for a broadcaster who doesn't have the balls to axe the Angelus and just replaces it with Angelus Lite Sponsored by Your Yoga-Loving Inner Spirit which still proclaims it's affiliation to the church on ever census even though you don't go to mass.

Basically the only thing good they do now is David Attenborough repeats, everything else toes the PC line, they killed off Top Gear and if you want liberal brainwashing BBC is perfect for that.

OneEightSeven

Billy86 wrote: »

They do also have a far, far larger population to draw from than us

This is why RTE is reluctant to report incidents involving immigrants and pushing for looser borders control with their Direct Provision propaganda series. RTE know our birthrates are below replacement level and immigration is the only thing making our population grow. They know that increasing our population is the only way they can be competitive and maintain their generous salaries.

Tchaikovsky

OneEightSeven wrote: »

This is why RTE is reluctant to report incidents involving immigrants and pushing for looser borders control with their Direct Provision propaganda series. RTE know our birthrates are below replacement level and immigration is the only thing making our population grow. They know that increasing our population is the only way they can be competitive and maintain their generous salaries.

Ireland's birth rate is the highest in the EU and the death rate is the lowest.

xi5yvm0owc1s2b

The population may be increasing, but children today live in an entirely different media world to their parents and grandparents. Many of them are not growing up watching RTE -- they're watching YouTube, Netflix, Amazon streaming video, etc.

Some families have ditched the TV entirely and do their viewing on tablets, laptops, and phones. A Netflix subscription costs less than a TV license.

I'd bet if you went into a class of 8-year-olds in Ireland today and asked what "RTE" is, a lot of them wouldn't have a notion.

When these kids grow up, the notion of spending 160 euro a year on a TV license, or even the notion of having a "national broadcaster," will seem so stupid and archaic that it will eventually have to be dropped.

TallGlass

Benjamin Tart Sideline wrote: »

When these kids grow up, the notion of spending 160 euro a year on a TV license, or even the notion of having a "national broadcaster," will seem so stupid and archaic that it will eventually have to be dropped.

Thats why the lads in the Dail are very very keen to rename it and include anything with an internet connection. I don't want to give the boyos in the Dail any ideas. Any change to the structure is going to result in a massive increase, confusion and alot of annoyed people.

CrankyHaus

theguzman wrote: »

Basically the only thing good they do now is David Attenborough repeats, everything else toes the PC line, they killed off Top Gear and if you want liberal brainwashing BBC is perfect for that.

On that note, whatever happened to good British TV comedy? Up to about ten years ago it was really strong and it just seems to have fallen off a cliff. I can't think of anything worth a watch now.

xi5yvm0owc1s2b

TallGlass wrote: »

Thats why the lads in the Dail are very very keen to rename it and include anything with an internet connection. I don't want to give the boyos in the Dail any ideas. Any change to the structure is going to result in a massive increase, confusion and alot of annoyed people.

Totally agreed.

The economics are already ridiculous.

You can buy a 50" 4K Smart TV today in Curry's for €449.

If you plan on keeping that TV for five years, it will cost you €800 to license it over that period.

That €449 TV will end up costing €1,249 because of RTE, even if you never watch a minute of RTE programming on it.

Try forcing people to pay €160 a year for the privilege of owning a laptop, smartphone, or tablet, and I think we'll have a revolution on our hands.