There are big plans in store for RTÉ2.

The national broadcaster today revealed plans for an increase in home-production with over 30 new series and 18 documentaries for its new season.

Exciting new arrivals to the channel will include the Rubberbandits Guide to 1916 and 2FM presenter Louise McSharry’s personal journey in F**k Cancer. 

Representatives for the channel said that the new season would see "more Irish-produced documentaries, comedy and entertainment for 15-34 year olds than any other channel in Ireland, along with an unrivalled selection of sporting action".

Also on the cards is an Irish version of the hit international format, First Dates.

Twenty new episodes of the hard-hitting Reality Bites strand, which reflects real Irish life, will be delivered on Thursday nights, tackling topics from cancer to mothers on methadone, sulky racing, dangerous dog breeds and recreational drug use.

Maia Dunphy, Angela Scanlon and Vogue Williams each host a documentary series this season: Maia looks at matters close to her own heart, childbirth and the modern Irish emigrant experience, Angela explores celebrity life for some well known Irish names including WWE’s Sheamus in Close Encounters, and Vogue meets women who defy traditional perceptions of the ‘fairer sex’ as three-part series Mean Girls looks at the sexually adventurous, the MMA fighting and some law breaking women.

Baz Ashmawy returns to RTÉ2 to explore his Muslim heritage in new documentary series, The Lost Muslim, while Bressie tackles a subject close to his heart as he seeks to demonstrate the link between physical exercise and positive mental health, training four people to compete in a gruelling half-Ironman challenge in Bressie’s Iron Mind.

Other new factual programming includes two-part series The Guards which goes behind the scenes of frontline policing in Dublin’s city centre and new series Young, Dumb and Deadly looks at high profile Irish crimes– from one punch deaths to murder - caused by wreckless behaviour and committed by young people in Ireland and abroad.

New series Wasted explores life for Ireland’s twentysomethings scraping by on social welfare and navigating unpaid internships while Nurses follows six recently graduated nurses at the coalface in some of the country’s busiest hospitals and care institutions.

Panti comes to 2 as the feature length documentary Panti: The Queen of Ireland follows Ireland’s most famous drag queen and self-styled “accidental activist”.

The Republic of Telly favourites Bridget and Eamon are getting their own series, while The Rubberbandits’ Guide to 1916 provides a crash course in Irish history. Brand new series Après Match of the Day revisits the glory days of Irish sport and in Eureka, Neil Delamere puts himself in peril to demonstrate the ‘eureka moments’ of our time.