{"id":119786,"date":"2025-10-13T18:17:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T18:17:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/119786\/"},"modified":"2025-10-13T18:17:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-13T18:17:10","slug":"oireachtas-tv-broadcaster-not-seeking-to-extend-contract-worth-estimated-e7m-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/119786\/","title":{"rendered":"Oireachtas TV broadcaster not seeking to extend contract worth estimated \u20ac7m \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The company providing audio and video coverage of Oireachtas <\/a>proceedings is not seeking to renew its contract, which runs out at the end of the year.<\/p>\n

Pi Comms<\/a>, which broadcasts the D\u00e1il, Seanad, and all committee proceedings via the Oireachtas TV channel, outlined its decision in a letter to employees on Friday, the deadline for submitting tenders for the new contract. <\/p>\n

The private operator was selected by the Oireachtas in 2011 following a tender process and has been reappointed twice. The last contract was worth an estimated \u20ac7 million.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Oireachtas broadcasting workers may strike over pay and conditionsOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

In their letter, joint managing directors Norah-Anne Barron and Conor O\u2019Brien said the \u201cdifficult decision followed a careful review of the new contract framework\u201d.<\/p>\n

Several factors taken together \u201cmeant the framework could not be responsibly pursued in its current form. Continuing under the proposed terms would, in our considered view, create difficulties over the next contract cycle\u201d.<\/p>\n

The contractor\u2019s decision not to retender also follows protests by broadcast employees over their terms and conditions, which garnered cross-party support from more than 160 TDs and Senators, including four Ministers of State. <\/p>\n

They signed a letter to the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission<\/a>, citing a \u201ccompelling case\u201d for it directly to employ the 10 full-time and 20 part-time professional broadcast workers providing the coverage, \u201cgiven the extremely concerning working conditions and pay issues\u201d.<\/p>\n

Up to 13 employees signed on the dole during Easter, summer and Christmas recesses and they alleged \u201cprecarious and uncertain working hours\u201d, lack of pension entitlement and \u201cpay that is significantly below the industry norm\u201d.<\/p>\n

Pi Comms insisted that the rates of pay of all part-time staff were benchmarked against industry norms and their total earnings were \u201cproportionate to the overall work undertaken throughout the year\u201d.<\/p>\n

In their letter, the managing directors told employees the \u201ctendered framework presented quite a few challenges\u201d that would affect everyone and \u201cthe new terms introduced conditions that reduced the scope for stable, sustainable delivery\u201d.<\/p>\n

For full-time staff, the \u201cexpanded service requirements and scope of responsibilities carried significant risk\u201d and an \u201cunsustainable basis\u201d for delivery within the budget.<\/p>\n

For part-time employees, \u201cthe continuation of the pay-per-public-minute model imposes limits which constrain\u201d. Under the pay-per-public-minute model, the contractor receives no payment during recess periods.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had hoped this would evolve into a more sustainable structure providing guarantees to the supplier to better support planning and long-term service continuity.<\/p>\n

\"\"Head-to-head: Presidential election gets confrontational<\/p>\n

These \u201ccombined factors as a whole, rising expectations, fixed budgets, and unbalanced utilisation risk, would make the contract unsustainable to deliver in its current form\u201d.<\/p>\n

Pi Comms said, however, it would work closely with the Oireachtas Commission \u201cto ensure a smooth and professional handover\u201d and its priority \u201cwill be continuity for staff, for the service, and for the client\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cPi Comms will continue to meet all obligations in full, maintaining operational stability so that the essential work of the Oireachtas proceeds.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Houses of the Oireachtas Commission, which has responsibility for the contract tender, declined to comment.<\/p>\n

Public Accounts Committee chairman John Brady <\/a>said the decision \u201cis a little bit of a surprise \u2026 I\u2019m not quite sure how many, if any, other companies have put in expressions of interest\u201d.<\/p>\n

He added that, \u201cgiven the levels of concern\u201d about employees having to sign on the dole during recess periods, it renews \u201cthe demands for the service to be brought in-house\u201d.<\/p>\n

Chairman of the Arts, Media and Communications committee Alan Kelly <\/a>said to \u201cbring the service in-house and to employ the staff directly following confirmation that this company is no longer going to do this work\u201d, would be \u201cthe right thing to do\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The company providing audio and video coverage of Oireachtas proceedings is not seeking to renew its contract, which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119787,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,4766,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-119786","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-latest-news","17":"tag-latestnews","18":"tag-main-news","19":"tag-mainnews","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-oireachtas","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}