End of the road for some familiar RTE faces?

According to reports today, some of RTE’s ‘familiar faces’ will not have their contracts renewed as the station tries to save some money.

We knew things were tight in RTE – the endless, endless, endless repeats of Reeling in the Years are proof of that – but we didn’t think it was so bad that some of the stations biggest names would be allowed to walk away.

However, that seems to be the case as the Irish Independent reports today that some very ‘familiar faces’ are not going to be retained, as a ‘source’ says: "Many presenters simply won't get a new contract from RTE this year. Familiar faces are disappearing off TV screens."

The paper says that the likes of Ryan Tubridy, Grainne Seoige and Kathryn Thomas are safe but with money very scarce in Montrose, some presenters are doomed.

In its annual report yesterday, RTE confirmed it had a deficit of €16.8m last year and that is having knock-on effects as they attempt to claw that back.

Fewer programmes are being made, hence the repeats, and fewer programmes means less work even for those presenters that are kept on.

"Presenters get paid for the amount of work they do but where a presenter might have previously had three or four series on RTE, now that could be reduced to just one series over their 12-month contract," the paper’s ‘informed source’ says.

It all sounds very grim out there.