RTÉ unable to fulfil remit due to falling revenues, station’s chief warns

Dee Forbes says ‘cuts and asset disposals cannot sustain RTÉ’ at pivotal moment for the broadcaster

Dee Forbes, director general of RTÉ, says the broadcaster’s income has ‘sharply contracted’ at a time when it needs to invest in journalism. Picture: Fergal Phillips

Persistently declining revenues have left RTÉ unable to fulfil its remit or carry out its “prescribed role”, the station’s director general has warned.

Dee Forbes will today tell the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that RTÉ reduced its staff numbers by 22 per cent between 2008 and 2019 against a backdrop of falling incomes at the national broadcaster.

RTÉ’s most recently filed financial statements, from 2019, showed a €7.2 million deficit – which Forbes said “underscores ...