‘Not credible’ that Dee Forbes only person with knowledge of events, says Taoiseach

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said he does not believe it is “credible” that former RTÉ director general Dee Forbes was “the only person with knowledge” of the hidden payments made to presenter Ryan Tubridy.

Mr Varadkar also said while the State broadcaster’s statement on Tuesday “shed some light on what has transpired, a lot of questions remain open”.

Speaking during Leaders’ Questions on Wednesday, the Taoiseach said a further Grant Thornton review in relation to non-disclosed payments made at RTÉ between 2017 and 2019 would be concluded within four weeks and the Government did not believe this timeline was “satisfactory”. Consequently, a request has been made that it to be provided “more quickly than that”.

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

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Mr Varadkar said the Government also expected “a full and open engagement” from RTÉ executives at the Oireachtas committees.

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“Certainly we do not believe it is credible that the former DG Dee Forbes was the only person with knowledge of these events,” he added.

Mr Varadkar said executives should explain at the committee hearings why it would take four weeks to put the information regarding 2017 to 2019 in the public domain.

“I don’t understand that and the Minister [Catherine Martin] doesn’t understand that either and we’ve made that clear,” he said.

The Fine Gael leader said the revelations from RTÉ last week were “deeply unsettling” and have “shaken public trust in what is an important institution. We want to see trust restored quickly because we need to have a strong and effective public service broadcaster for our State.”

Sinn Féin: ‘selevtive information’

Mr Varadkar was responding to Sinn Féin deputy leader Pearse Doherty, who said RTÉ had “finally released” some “selective information” on Tuesday but that it “skirts around the issues that are at the heart of this fiasco”.

“It leaves more questions than answers,” he said. “Reading the RTÉ statement, you would be led to believe that Dee Forbes was the only person who knew about this, but that simply isn’t credible. More than half of the executive board had knowledge about the commercial contract at a time of pay cuts for workers in RTÉ, at a time when people were struggling to pay the annual licence fee during a cost-of-living crisis, in order to falsely portray that Ryan Tubridy was taking a pay cut, RTÉ created a sweetheart deal and an elaborate plan to cover it up.”

The Donegal TD added that “we have got to get to the bottom of this quickly” and the State had “absolutely no idea whatsoever” from RTÉ's latest statement about what happened in 2017, 2018 and 2019 regarding payments to Tubridy.

“If there is to be full transparency, the public needs to know about these payments,” he said. “It is not acceptable that we’re being asked to wait another month for more information to be released.”

Labour leader Ivana Bacik said despite RTÉ's lengthy statement, “we are still in the dark today”. Ms Bacik said the direct impact on those working in RTÉ could not be “overestimated” and urged the Government to include workers’ rights issues in their external review and that it was “essential”.