Government approves legislation to assign Comptroller and Auditor General as auditor of RTÉ

Minister O’Donovan to publish Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill

The Minister for Culture, Communications and Sport, Patrick O’Donovan TD, has today received Government approval to publish the Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill.

The Bill will enhance transparency, accountability and value-for-money in RTÉ and TG4 by:

• assigning the Comptroller & Auditor General as auditor of RTÉ;
• strengthening the authority, role, functions and required expertise of the Boards of RTÉ and TG4
• enhancing the statutory framework through which Coimisiún na Meán assess the performance and funding of RTÉ and TG4;
• strengthening provisions relating to the functions, duties, accountability, appointment and dismissal of the Directors General of RTÉ and TG4;
• providing for greater transparency in the anonymised reporting of the remuneration of employees and contractors;
• extending media service duties and codes to all non-broadcast content published by RTÉ and TG4;
• strengthening the independence and authority of the Audience Councils of RTÉ and TG4.

The Bill also:

• establishes a new statutory framework for the provision of public service content by the wider media sector in Ireland;
• provides for the payment by RTÉ of at least 25% of their annual public funding into the RTÉ independent programmes account for the purposes of commissioning programming from the independent sector;
• ensures that any European Works levy (‘Netflix levy’) may only be imposed by Coimisiún na Meán following a Ministerial direction;
• provides Coimisiún na Meán with additional information-gathering powers for the purpose of supervising Ireland’s Online Safety Framework.

Welcoming approval to publish the Bill, Minister O’Donovan said:

The Bill will now be presented to the Houses of the Oireachtas to follow the parliamentary process to enactment.

Notes for Editors

The text of the Bill will be available on the Oireachtas website in the coming days.

General Scheme and pre-legislative scrutiny

On 8 April 2025, the Government approved the publication of the General Scheme of the Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill and its referral to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Media, Communications, Culture and Sport for pre-legislative scrutiny. Following its establishment, on 8 May 2025 the General Scheme was referred to the Committee, which subsequently published its report on pre-legislative scrutiny on 17 September 2025. Following an in-depth analysis of the Committee’s 85 recommendations, in February 2026 the Minister wrote to the Committee setting out that 68 recommendations can or already have been addressed, including in existing legislation and by incorporation into the Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill.

Future of Media Commission

In July 2022, the Government published the report of the Future of Media Commission (FOMC) and accepted, in principle, 49 of its 50 recommendations. The Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill gives effect to:

• Recommendations 6 – 1 to 6 – 7 and 8 – 5 on the conversion of the existing Broadcasting Fund to a platform-neutral Media Fund;
• Recommendations 5 – 1, 5 – 3, 8 – 2, and 8 – 3 as they relate to a more effective system to assess the performance and funding of public service media providers;
• Recommendation 5 - 10 which recommended that RTÉ’s spending on the independent programme account should rise to 25% of public funding;
• Recommendation 8 – 9 which recommended providing a statutory basis for Coimisiún na Meán expanded remit.

Expert Advisory Committee on Governance and Culture

In May 2024, the Government published the Independent Review of the Governance and Culture of RTÉ prepared by an Expert Advisory Committee (EAC) chaired by Professor Niamh Brennan and accepted, in principle, all of its recommendations. In June 2024, the Department published an Implementation Plan. The Bill gives effect to the following recommendations:

• Recommendations 6.31 and 6.37 on the assignment of the Comptroller and Auditor General as auditor of RTÉ;
• Recommendations 4.1, 5.1, 5.15, and 5.19 as they apply to the Board, Board Committees and Directors General of RTÉ and TG4.

European Media Freedom Act

The EU European Media Freedom Act aims to strengthen the internal market for media services and protect media pluralism and media independence in the EU by harmonising relevant national rules and procedures. The majority of EMFA is being implemented in Irish law through the Media Regulation Bill 2026. Article 5 of EMFA, which relates to the independence and funding of public service media providers, is being implemented through the Broadcasting (Amendment) Bill.

Key provisions relating to corporate governance of RTÉ and TG4

The Bill strengthens the legislative underpinning of the corporate governance of RTÉ and TG4 by:

• assigning the Comptroller and Auditor General as auditor of RTÉ;
• clarifying and expanding provisions relating to the functions, duties, accountability, appointment and dismissal of the Directors General of RTÉ and TG4;
• clarifying and expanding provisions relating to the functions, duties, role and necessary expertise of the boards and board committees of RTÉ and TG4.

Enhanced framework for the assessment of the performance and funding of RTÉ and TG4

The Bill provides for an enhanced mechanism for assessing the performance and appropriate funding of RTÉ and TG4 by:

• requiring Coimisiún na Meán to assess and appraise the funding needs of and set detailed performance targets for RTÉ and TG4 every 3 years, the first of which is to be submitted by 30 June 2027 and cover the period 2028 – 2030;
• providing that the Minister shall submit the 3-yearly appraisal to Government no later than 6 weeks after the publication of the Estimates in the same year (with the first year being 2027);
• providing that Coimisiún na Meán shall prepare and publish a detailed methodology and procedure for the 3-year appraisal including, inter alia, how to identify and quantify changes to the input costs and cost structures of RTÉ and TG4;
• requiring RTÉ and TG4 to prepare 3-yearly statements of strategy (instead of the current 5-yearly statements) based on the 3-yearly appraisal by Coimisiún na Meán with the first statements to cover the years 2028 – 2030; and
• providing that Coimisiún na Meán shall carry out two annual reviews:
  • the first due 30 June of each year which will examine the degree to which RTÉ and TG4 met their performance targets and received adequate funding in the previous year line with EMFA;
  • the second due 31 October of each year which will examine compliance with various State aid requirements (such as separate accounting of public service and commercial revenues and expenditure).

The Bill provides that the cost of this mechanism may be recovered by levy on RTÉ and TG4 only, thus ensuring the cost does not fall on commercial television and radio broadcasters.

Enhanced transparency

The Bill provides for additional reporting obligations on RTÉ and TG4 in respect of employee and contractor remuneration and commissioning activities by:

• providing that RTÉ and TG4 shall disclose information on the remuneration of staff and relevant contractors in monetary bands which shall be determined by the Minister having regard to Government policy on the disclosure of such information;
• providing that RTÉ and TG4 shall publish an annual report on the commissioning of independent productions including information on the name of the production, the name of the production company, the total cost of production in monetary bands which shall be determined by the Minister, and the public sector and Exchequer contribution to the cost of production as a percentage of the total cost of production.

Audience Councils

The audience councils of RTÉ and TG4 are intended to represent the views of the people of the island of Ireland to the boards of the RTÉ and TG4 regarding the activities undertaken by the providers to pursue their public service remit. The Bill will expand the role of the audience councils by:

• providing for the independence of the audience councils of RTÉ and TG4 and the selection of members of both councils by Coimisiún na Meán following a public competition;
• providing that an audience council may, in addition to the required annual report, prepare a special report;
• requiring RTÉ and TG4 to respond to both annual and special reports prepared by their audience councils.

Extension of regulatory duties and rules to non-broadcast content published by RTÉ and TG4

The Bill will extend the duties and codes which currently apply to broadcast and video-on-demand content to all public service content made available by RTÉ and TG4, including written content and sound programmes made available in online catalogues (‘podcasts’). This will enable audiences to make complaints directly to RTÉ and TG4 and then to Coimisiún na Meán regarding such content.

New framework for the provision of public service content

The Bill provides for a new framework to support the production, provision and archiving of public service content to be made available by public service content providers. In the Bill:

• ‘public service content’ means any audiovisual or sound programme, anything published in a press publication (in print or online), and types of online content (‘public service platform-based content’) which informs, educates or entertains and which relates to an exhaustive list of categories described in the Bill;
• a ‘public service content provider’ means a regulated entities (such as a broadcaster regulated by Coimisiún na Meán) or an entity subject to a recognised self-regulatory regime (such as a newspaper regulated by the Press Council).

The framework is composed of three key elements:

• Coimisiún na Meán will carry out 3-yearly reviews of public service content provision to assess gaps in public service content provision in the Irish and English languages and to recommend measures to address these gaps (the first of which must be submitted to the Minister by 30 June 2027 and cover the period 2028 - 2030);
• the Broadcasting Fund will be converted into a fund known as Ciste na Meán, which will continue to be funded on an annual basis by 7% of net TV licence fee receipts and an Exchequer allocation;
• out of the resources available to Ciste na Meán, Coimisiún na Meán will prepare and operate public service content funding schemes to fund the production of new public service content and measures to develop the capacity of public service content providers.

RTÉ Independent Programmes Account

To provide certainty to the independent production sector the Bill:

• requires RTÉ to pay at least 25% of its public funding into the independent programmes account on an annual basis (with a provision that Coimisiún na Meán may, following approval of the Minister, designate a higher figure);
• provide that Coimisiún na Meán may, following a recommendation made in the context of the 3-year review of the adequacy of public funding and subject to Ministerial agreement, provide by order for a higher figure than 25% if appropriate;
• provide that RTÉ may commission podcasts as well as radio programming and commission audiovisual programming exclusively for the RTÉ Player through the independent programmes account.

‘Netflix levy’

In accordance with Article 13 of the EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive, section 159E of the Broadcasting Act 2009 provides Coimisiún na Meán with the authority to impose a levy (termed the ‘European Works levy’ but commonly referred to as the ‘Netflix levy’) on audiovisual broadcasters and video-on-demand providers. The proceeds of the levy may be used by Coimisiún na Meán or Fís Éireann to fund new audiovisual programming.

To ensure democratic oversight and accountability, the Bill provides:

• that Coimisiún na Meán may only impose or revoke a levy on foot of a direction from the Minister;
• for the preparation by Coimisiún na Meán of, prior to the introduction of a levy, 3-yearly ex-ante reports on the prospective impact of a levy, and following the introduction of a levy, 3-yearly ex-post reports on the actual impact of a levy.

Additional powers for Coimisiún na Meán

Coimisiún na Meán already has extensive powers to require information from a provider (including the power to seek search warrants) following the opening of a formal investigation. Outside of investigations and as part of its supervisory function, it also has the power to require, by notice in writing, a regulated provider to provide Coimisiún na Meán with information relating to compliance with an Online Safety Code. The Bill will extend this information gathering power to require regulated entities to provide information relating to compliance with the Digital Services Act (DSA), media service codes and rules and the Terrorist Content Online Regulation.