In 2012 The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (“the BAI”) commissioned Crowe Horwath to undertake a statutory review of the Sound and Vision Scheme’s second iteration, covering the period from January 2010 to date. GMT Media was part of the team who conducted the review.

Our findings have now been published by BAI and are available here:

The Sound and Vision scheme is intended “to increase public access at national, local and community level to high-quality television and sound broadcasting programmes in English and Irish which explore the themes of Irish culture,

heritage and experience, in contemporary or historic contexts”. It is funded by top slicing the broadcast license fee which pays for public broadcasting in Ireland. 

The Scheme operates by providing funding to producers for the production of programming to be

broadcast free-to-air on BAI-approved channels. Proposed programmes must have prior support of a

broadcaster in order to be eligible to apply. Since Sound and Vision II commenced in 2010,

approximately 1,928 applications have been received, and 802 projects were awarded funding. Just

over €43.5m was awarded to these projects.

The scheme application numbers have risen significantly since the second iteration of the scheme began in 2010. It is an arrangement which is very unusual in the media world. It supports quality content of a kind unlikely to receive significant commercial funding - although some of the output supported by the scheme has proved to be extremely popular and has attracted additional commercial support as well.

In a country where there is much choice and competition from international as well as national broadcasters, the Scheme has proved valuable in BAI's efforts to support Irish language, culture and heritage.

It is worthy of study by any country which wants to preserve indigenous, independent production, in the face of strong foreign competition and in an environment made challenging by other pressures, such as small or falling advertising revenues. 

Jerry Timmins, Managing Director GMT Media Ltd