Fianna Fáil Councillor Kenneth O’Flynn has called on the Minister for
Communication to index link the television licence.
Speaking on this O’Flynn said; “RTÉ have been pointing out significant
salaries paid to bankers, politicians and public servants. Yet their
‘stars’ are all paid in excess of An Taoiseach or Barack Obama.”
Continuing O’Flynn said; “RTÉ have failed to deliver in terms of
commitments it made when it had a significant increase in the licence
fee back in 2001, when Síle de Valera was Minister and given that they
have argued the licence fee be index linked that now with deflation
the fee should be reduced.”
O’Flynn has stated that he believes that RTÉ essentially has index
linked its television licence fee to match the rate of inflation it is
now time to bring the fee in line with deflation and reduce it; In
February 2009, the CSO announced that during January 2009, the country
experienced deflation, with prices falling by 0.1% from the same time
in 2008. This is the first time deflation has hit the Irish economy
since 1960. Overall consumer prices decreased by 1.7% in that month.
Minister Lenihan in an interview has stated that month-on-month there
has been a 6.6% decline in the cost of living this year.”
In light of the deflation statistics Cllr. O’Flynn says that he feels
a move to index link the television licence to deflation and make a
cut in its costs.