The charge was actually €75 per day…imagine how expensive that would get if it was Dublin Bay North :-)
— Fearghal O’Connor (@Fearghaloc) March 1, 2016
Mary writes:
Just spotted these tweets about reporters having to pay to access the press area of the count in Mayo at the weekend. Is that normal? Do all reporters have to pay at every count centre?
Anyone?
Pic: Ferghal O’Connor
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A lot of reporters would have their own wifi dongle tbh.
Castlebar charged the last time they had an election count there but nobody paid as the service was so bad.
So is the payment for WIFI or physical access into the count centre?
More for the table and power socket I’d say. You can get into the count centre for free if you get a ticket from someone or (in the case of Limerick) if they only have people checking tickets at some of the doors.
Some folks even got spare tickets by going out via a monitored door (thus picking up a ticket for re-entry, and then coming back in via the unmonitored door, and handing the tickets to their mates).
There was a reporter team in Limerick with no desk, and using the TV camera battery to recharge the laptop. Wifi was very good there though.
Sounds like whinging to me
blushirts won’t like dat
Are you ok Dav? Genuinely worried now.
Castlebar are the only ones that charge…and media can’t access the press area if they haven’t paid, can’t set up a camera point, take a seat at a desk, use a plug. The council say the charge comes from the venue.
Charge does come from the venue. I’ve a friend who was down there as a reporter and just didn’t pay and had no problem with access. His point was that the service was so bad last time that there was no way he was going to pay.
Who does the money go to? The count centre itself – i.e. the local national school?
It’s a theatre, so the theatre.
The count center was procured by the County Registrar who is responsible
the count and for public access, the provision of WiFi acess may have been provided by count center owners and which would not be under the direct control
of the of the Registrar and would have had a secure password to WiFi spot.
If there was a fee like 75 Euro per day…..who will go back to there again.
Contrast this with the Sligo Count which was broadcast live by Ocean FM on the web for two days, it is also noticable that counts are complete and delayed to suit RTE so that they feed them into Montrose…..this should cease, RTE can record the public decleration by the Registrar.