Two interventions by the former minister for communications, Mr Ray Burke, had the effect of saving Century Radio more than £820,000 in transmission fees due to RTE, the tribunal has heard.
Mr Des O'Neill SC, for the tribunal, said these were substantial savings that resulted from the minister's intervention in January 1989 to get RTE to cut its proposed fee, and the issuing of a directive two months later which further reduced the charges.
Mr Sean Connolly, who was secretary of the Independent Radio and Television Commission at the time, said the commission didn't see itself as having a key role in negotiating transmission charges. That was for the successful licence applicant to do with RTE.
However, Mr O'Neill said, it appeared that the position of the IRTC, which wanted the charges reduced, remained constant through the various deliberations.
Mr Connolly agreed. The witness revealed that the IRTC knew RTE had reached a deal on transmission charges with the Department of Communications before oral hearings for the award of a national radio licence in 1989.
With the minister's approval, the Department and RTE agreed a fee of £692,000 for broadcasting the signal of the new commercial radio station on January 11th, 1989. Applicants for the new franchise made oral presentations to the IRTC on the following day.
Mr Connolly said the issue of transmission costs was "not a major plank" in the commission's consideration of the different applications. The issue would not determine whether an application succeeded or not. A station's ability to earn revenue was more important.
He said the £692,000 sum was "still a negotiating figure" which was "getting closer to Century's figure". RTE had originally proposed a charge of £1.14 million, but Mr Connolly said this was regarded as an "opening gambit" from the major rival.
"The commission still felt we were at an early stage of negotiations and the figures would change again." There was a "distinct" expectation that further negotiations would follow after the licence was awarded.
Asked what basis there was for this expectation, he said the commission had decided it would actively support "whomsoever" got the franchise. It would do nothing to the detriment of the commercial reality of the new station: "The commission would not rock the boat in a way that would tie the hands of the franchise-holders."
In its licence application, Century said its viability would be jeopardised if the station had to pay more than £375,000 for transmission charges. The IRTC secretariat prepared a question on this subject but it was never asked.
Mr Connolly said the commission chose not to ask the question publicly. He suspected this was because it didn't want to "tie the hands" of a successful licence applicant in further negotiations with RTE. To ask about this matter in public would be "handing RTE a pack of aces".
