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RTÉ crisis: Thousands don’t pay TV licence fee in wake of secret payment scandal

RTÉ crisis: Thousands don’t pay TV licence fee in wake of secret payment scandal© Provided by Irish Examiner

There has been a drop of almost €1m in TV licence fee revenue since the RTÉ secret payments scandal emerged, raising concerns that the broadcaster will need a financial bailout.

The number of people paying the TV licence has fallen by 5,837 across June and the first week of July when compared to the same period last year.

This represents a loss in income of €933,920, although non-payers may eventually be forced to pay.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar last night encouraged the public to continue to pay the TV licence fee and said he is hopeful the State will not have to bail RTÉ out.

“I’m going to continue to pay the TV licence fee and would encourage other people to do so as well,” Mr Varadkar said in Brussels.

“Not just because it’s the law, but also because it is used to fund public service broadcasting, and that goes beyond RTÉ and funds a lot of the media production and broadcasting that we all value, whether it’s sports or children’s programming, Irish language programming, music — all those things that really have nothing to do with the recent controversy.”

His comments came as the latest figures, released to Fine Gael Kerry South TD Brendan Griffin, show a sharp decline in the number of people paying the licence fee since the controversy relating to secret payments to presenter Ryan Tubridy came to light.

Mr Griffin said Media Minister Catherine Martin needs to put a contingency plan in place to mitigate against the possible effects of continued revenue loss, adding that if the trend continues it will lead to a serious funding crisis.