TG4 has played a significant role in the development of Ireland’s independent production sector and spends about 70-80 per cent of its income each year on programming from that source. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho
S4C, which serves a population of 3.1 million people, received the equivalent of about €105 million in licence fee funding in 2022-2023 compared with “The station is very limited in what it can spend on new programming and on sports and news provision. operates on a very small budget when compared to other operators in the same sector.”
The additional funding for TG4 includes €3.9 million to further develop Cúla4, €1.3 million for the creation of new content for the under-35 market and €13.6 million for the development of an independent news service, in line with a recommendation made by Coimisiún um Thodhchaí na Meán. The €26 million also includes allocations for the development of education resources and supports and €3.4 million for arts programming.
Proposals include an additional €16.5 million for investment in the Gaeltacht; €14.5 million for investment in Irish-language supports outside of the Gaeltacht; and the additional €26 million for TG4.