Income from the TV licence fee continues to decline, with €47.89 million generated from just under 300,000 TV licences sold in the first five months of this year.
New figures provided by Minister of State at the Department of Communications, Charlie McConalogue, reveal that the 299,373 licences sold to the end of May represent a 4.5% decrease year on year, reports Breaking News.
Minister McConalogue noted that the 299,373 licences for the first five months of 2026 compare with 768,000 sold across all of 2025 — itself a 3% decline on the 792,000 licences sold in 2024.
In 2023, the year the RTÉ secret payments controversy came to light, TV licence sales fell by 13% from 947,924 in 2022 to 824,278, reports Breaking News.
In response to the figures, Sinn Féin TD Darren O’Rourke stated that it was clear “that the TV licence funding model is completely broken.”
Deputy O’Rourke claimed that “the single biggest contributing factor is scandal after scandal in RTÉ,” and pointed out that in 2019, over one million TV licences were sold, reports Breaking News.
Deputy O’Rourke said: “This is a very significant decrease and it calls into serious question the fundamental funding model for public sector broadcasting in this State.”
In his oral Dáil response, Minister McConalogue told Deputy O’Rourke that the decline in TV licences sold in recent years had been driven by three factors, reports Breaking News.
He said: “First, an ageing population means that the number of households qualifying for a free TV licence increases every year by between 13,000 and 20,000.
“Second, the number of households without a liable television set has increased, driven by changes in the way that people access audiovisual services.
“Third, there has been a marked increase in evasion since the revelations regarding presenter payments and governance failings in RTÉ in July 2023,” reports Breaking News.
Minister McConalogue said that in July 2024, the Government decided the TV licence system would be retained, underpinned by improvements in collection and compliance to maximise revenue generation, and that the technical working group on reform and enhancement of the licence had been reconvened to bring forward proposals.
He said that the Minister for Culture, Communications and Sport, Patrick O’Donovan, had recently received the group’s report and would decide on next steps with Government colleagues, reports Breaking News.
Deputy McConalogue said that the report “will be considered and I have no doubt over the next short period we will step it out in responding to it and plotting the way forward.”
“There are real challenges there as we all accept. It is really important we see the continuing reform happening at RTÉ to build confidence in the public in terms of people purchasing their TV licence.
“I think we all agree it is more important than ever at the moment that we have a good public service broadcaster in this country and have that service.
“When we see what is happening in the level of disinformation and misinformation now in the online world, having a credible authoritative public service broadcaster is more important than ever.
“We have recognised that at Government level in putting the funding streams in place to support RTÉ. It is important we ensure there is a sustainable way forward and a strong broadcaster underpinned by that funding into the future,” reports Breaking News.
The €160 TV licence is collected by An Post, with revenues going to the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport, which provides approximately 85% to RTÉ to fulfil its public service media commitments, a further 7% to Coimisiún na Meán, and approximately 6% to An Post in respect of its licence collection activities, reports Breaking News.
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