COLUM KENNY,
Sir, - Mr Enda O'Kane is to be thanked for drawing attention to the remarkable "sale" by RTÉ of Ireland's only long-wave transmission network (The Irish Times December 29th.)
This service, known as Radio Tara or Atlantic 252, has been licensed by successive Ministers under legislation governing the establishment of RTÉ, yet has been disposed of in a manner that has allowed foreign, commercial owners to do as they wish with it.
The circumstances in which this frequency originally became operative, and in which it has been traded, are shrouded in mystery and there are a number of disturbing aspects to its history and operations. Moreover, apart from certain political and cultural issues to which its use gives rise, the absence of open and regulated competition for the privilege of operating such a scarce frequency is unacceptable.
Mr O'Kane is committed to the ideals of public service broadcasting and argues that the frequency might be better used to serve Irish people living abroad. Instead, it has been deployed by a multinational as a platform for a crass pop-music station aimed at British audiences.
It is now, reportedly, to be used by a UK sports service. Whether or not RTE even got the best possible deal out of its trading in the frequency is unknown. RTÉ pleads public service while it plays the market.
Mr O'Kane's lonely fight to draw attention to this remarkable use of a public asset, licensed to RTÉ, underlines a broader political apathy towards the control and use of Irish airwaves, and towards the importance of the media in general as a national resource.
The highly sophisticated plotting and manipulation of the public by media organisations is not matched by a similar level of political sophistication, or by the will or ability to ensure that market forces are regulated as much as they might be in the interests of the general public. - Yours, etc.,
COLUM KENNY,
Dublin City University,
Dublin 9.