A Limerick A Day

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RTÉ newsreader Sharon ni Bheolain has criticised the gender pay gap at the station that allows male colleagues like Bryan Dobson (left) earn more for the same work

The women who work on TV
Are saying that they’d like to see
If themselves and the males
Are on different pay scales
For the same shows inside RTÉ

John Moynes

Pic: RTÉ

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18 thoughts on “A Limerick A Day

  1. edalicious

    While I do agree that unequal pay is not cool, it’s interesting to see how hard INM have been pushing this. Similar to all the right-leaning press in the UK going on about the BBC pay gap.

  2. Otis Blue

    Some clarity on presenter’s pay, terms and conditions (whether staff or contractor) would be welcome. Then we’d be in a better position to judge what inequities exist.

  3. Andrew

    Reading the news. Six figures. I’m not sure either are actual journalists.
    Like the BBC story, the diversion here is the gender pay gap. The REAL story is the out of control pay. RTE loses money every year yet increases wages? It undercuts on advertising using the licence fee,thus commanding a false share of the advertising market.
    The need for a large public service is questionable in 2017.
    have a public service broadcaster by all means but it needs to be seriously trimmed and it needs to be an actual public service.
    The raison d’etre for public services broadcasters has changed since their inception in first half of the last century

    1. ahjayzis

      “The need for a large public service is questionable in 2017.”

      I’ll disagree with you until the day media plurality is protected by regulation and Dinny and Co. aren’t creating a rival monopoly by buying every media outlet that comes on the market.

      RTE in many ways is a pile of shyte, but the independent sector is in no position to try take over.

      1. Andrew

        I don’t rely on RTE Or Redacted for my information. Broadsheet themselves do a better job in covering the Discovery tribunal/enquiry or whatever it’s called and could possibly do a better job if they operated in a fair market like so many other news sites.
        The independent sector isn’t in a position precisely because of RTE’s dominance.

        1. ahjayzis

          Do you have faith in our government and the ideology of FF/FG to ensure a free and fearless media in an oligarchs hands? They’ve so far been too frit or bought to halt the rise of one monopoly.

          Look at ITV and see what a Tory mindset allows people to get away with on public bandwidth. Zero investigative, zero probing, all clickbait and brain takeaway.

          1. Andrew

            Why should the state be involved in broadcasting? Why? Because the public don’t know what’s good for them? is that it? That’s elitist nonsense
            As I said before, if it MUST be involved, then trim it right down. provide a news service and some investigative programme and leave it at that.
            Right now it’s merely a vehicle to get ruck for an anointed few AND for some to peddle whatever agenda takes their fancy at any particular time. Joe Duffy is an example of an ego allowed to run away with itself.
            There is no reason his show or him should be subsidised by the tax payer. It is essentially a phone -in cranks jamboree normally sneered at and vilified when it’s a commercial channel late at night doing the exact same thing.

          2. rotide

            you don’t seem to understand that if RTE wasn’t a public service, there would be MORE programmes like Joe Duffy, not less.

  4. ahjayzis

    I’d say Marian and Miriam skew the statistics somewhat.

    While we’re all rightly outraged when we discover someone is earning 300,000 when in reality they should be earning 450,000, let’s focus on the actual scandal of what someone like Bo Juffy earns and the fact no one else, ever, would consider paying him that.

    1. Nigel

      Shouldn’t these judgements be based less on personal antipathy (which I share) and more on audience size?

  5. Andrew

    They receive the market rate, only from a decidedly non-market derived source.

    The concerted effort to turn RTE salaries into a broader lesson about entrenched sexism is misplaced.

    The pay of these few wealthy personalities is not set by normal criteria. There are no salary scales, annual increments, or promotions to be formally applied for. We have no way of comparing the work of Des Cahill with Ray Darcy’s laboured efforts. Their pay isn’t determined by the hours they work or the artistic or intellectual merit of what they produce. Instead, ‘RTE personalities get what their agents demand and what the RTE is prepared to offer.
    There does not seem to be much hard negotiation as the knowledge the tax payer can step in to plug any deficit is always there and has always been there in the past.
    The assumption that RTE can just take all the money gained from the sale of state land is not even debated anywhere. Why?

    1. ahjayzis

      Didn’t Pat Kenny leaving Radio 1 put the lie to any kind of market forces? People listen to RTE because it’s RTE, not because the wealthy geriatric in the hot seat is particularly amazing.

      1. bisted

        …according to an RTE insider the Joe Duffys/Ryan Tubridys/Miriam and Marian etc are known as the ‘talent’…ffs…they are always whinging about being under-valued and whinger-in-chief used to be Gerry Ryan…

        1. rotide

          I hate to be the one to ruin your insider dreams but ‘talent’ is the word used in TV and Film for the on camera personel and is no more unique to RTE than the word ‘shill’ is unique to BS.

          1. bisted

            …I didn’t think I was privy to some great revelation but I did find it funny…if not a bit absurd…but then you luvvies do seem to exist in your own bubble…

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