Considerable disquiet remains after RTÉ Oireachtas hearing, says Minister for Media Catherine Martin

Minister for Media Catherine Martin has said the appearance by senior RTÉ executives at today’s Oireachtas committee hearing has “not calmed the considerable disquiet” at the national broadcaster.

Ms Martin said the appearance at the Oireachtas committee on media “revealed a shocking failure of governance at senior management level in RTÉ”.

She said that at Thursday’s follow-on meeting of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), it will be “vital” that the executive board “engages in as transparent a manner as possible, and I urge those present to responsibly account for the decisions taken which have seriously damaged the public’s trust in public service broadcasting. My focus remains on the external review of governance and culture at RTÉ and, to that end, today I have had constructive meetings with the RTÉ Trade Union Group and Screen Producers Ireland.

RTÉ still struggling with fallout from Tubridy’s secret pay deal

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“Furthermore, the four-week timeline for the delivery of the second Grant Thornton report does not reflect the urgency of the situation and I have asked for that to be accelerated,” she said, referring to a further forensic account into other payments made between 2017 and 2019.

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At the hearing, RTÉ chief financial officer Richard Collins said the misstated fees for Ryan Tubridy between 2017 and 2019 relate to a loyalty bonus he was owed which was credited against his earnings.

Sinn Féin TD Imelda Munster asked Mr Collins about the €120,000 of previously undisclosed payments.

Mr Collins replied: “This was an adjustment that was made to the figures. Basically, in short, Ryan Tubridy was due a loyalty bonus at the end of his contract of €120,000. That was never paid, was never accrued from the accounts, but for an unexplained reason that €120,000 was credited against his earnings between 2017 and 2019. That’s under investigation at the moment by [external financial services firm] Grant Thornton.”

He said this was signed off by former director general Dee Forbes and the chief financial officer of the time. The scandal around misrepresented payments to Tubridy also dominated the Fine Gael parliamentary party meeting, where Taoiseach Leo Varadkar told members that the controversy was “very damaging” to RTÉ.

It is understood that Fine Gael TD Patrick O’Donovan said there was a serious disconnect between RTÉ and the taxpayer and that there was a “veil of secrecy”.

Need for reform

Labour arts spokeswoman Marie Sherlock said questions remain and that serious reform is required.

“Following the committee hearing, it is clear there is a level of dysfunction within the RTÉ executive that is untenable. While many questions remain from today’s hearing, one clear outcome from today is the need for reform.

“There are clear culture, trust and accountability issues with evidence to suggest that executives operated in silos and did not confer on matters of mutual responsibility and that allegations that a director general could issue an instruction which would not be questioned by other executives in the organisation.

“It is extraordinary that the CFO [chief financial officer] “took comfort” from the knowledge that transactions were approved by the director general. This is an abdication of responsibility, it is at odds with good accounting standards and appears contrary to the apparent efforts to bring the barter account on to the balance sheet of RTÉ from 2021. It’s astounding that the commercial director took instruction from the director general and failed to have proper records of this highly unusual transaction.

“Many questions still remain about the anonymised invoices, the shocking processing cost of over €80,000 for a €150,000 transaction routed through a third party to pay the agent of Ryan Tubridy, and the ‘urgency’ with which the payments were made in order to waive the ‘end of contract’ payment. More positively, the chair acknowledged that serious reform is now required and that the business model with regard to negotiation of ‘talent’ fees needs to be reviewed.”

Unavailable to attend

Former RTÉ director general Dee Forbes, who resigned from her position on Monday, did not appear before the committee on health grounds. RTÉ director of content Jim Jennings was also unavailable to attend.

Attending Wednesday’s meeting was chairwoman of the board Siún Ní Raghallaigh, board member Anne O’Leary and staff representative to the board Robert Shortt.

Interim deputy director general Adrian Lynch, commercial director Geraldine O’Leary, strategy director Rory Coveney and chief financial officer Richard Collins also attended.

RTÉ executives are now set to appear before the PAC on Thursday.