As it happened: RTÉ appears before Public Accounts Committee
Senior RTÉ executives and board members faced a second day of questioning at an Oireachtas committee on the controversy over secret payments to presenter Ryan Tubridy.
The Public Accounts Committee met in Leinster House to examine recent revelations regarding the transparency of RTÉ.
The meeting with current and former representatives of RTÉ and officials from the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media led by the secretary general, Katherine Licken, examined commercial arrangements entered into by RTÉ and its presenters, including those underwritten by RTÉ that have impacted on and relate to the expenditure of public monies.
It came as the new host of The Late Late Show, Patrick Kielty, revealed he will be paid €250,000 per series.
Tubridy stepped down from the flagship light entertainment show in May after 14 years at the helm and Co Down comedian Kielty was subsequently unveiled as his successor.
You can read a summary of the proceedings as it happened below.
Former chair of the RTÉ board Moya Doherty said it was “staggering” that neither she nor her board colleagues were aware of the existence of a barter account for RTÉ during their tenure.
She said: “None of us knew of the existence of this barter fund, which was outside of the financial department, and therefore not reported to us as a board during our monthly meetings, and did not exist in the monthly management account.
“For me, as chair, and for my colleagues on the board, that is staggering and absolutely shocking … we didn’t even pick up in the corridors of RTÉ the existence of the barter fund.”
She said despite it being common, “it raises the bigger issue now about the tension between commercial and public service”.
She later told the committee: “It is incredibly difficult to ask questions and to expect answers if there are secret and clandestine agreements that are not registered on the books.”
Staff representative on the RTÉ board and RTÉ economics correspondent Robert Shortt said he was shocked when he heard about the barter account for the first time on March 21st as part of his role on the board.
In response to perks from the barter account, Mr Shortt said the joke among RTÉ staff is that getting a free copy of the RTÉ Guide every week “is the perk”, adding they sometimes do not even get a copy of the Christmas edition.
Paula Mullooly, RTÉ’s director of legal affairs, said there is “a number of active and threatened” litigation in relation to the issues around RTÉ’s guarantee to underwrite commercial payments to Ryan Tubridy.
When asked by TD Alan Kelly for a recording of the Microsoft Teams meeting from May 7th, 2020, where it has been said the guarantee for RTÉ to underwrite the payments was made to Mr Tubridy’s agent, he was told it had not been recorded.
“There is a note of the call taken by the lawyer who was present,” Ms Mullooly said.
When asked for the note by next Thursday, Ms Mullooly said: “The note forms part of the legal advice in the context of this file, it is covered by legal professional privilege.
“I have an issue in the context of this matter where there is a number of active and threatened litigation, and I need to protect the legal professional privilege in respect of this.”
When asked again for the note by the chair, Ms Mullooly said she did not believe she was in a position to waive the legal privilege.
“I’m happy to answer questions as best I can, within the confines of dealing with that legal privilege, but there are very significant legal issues around this.
“In fairness, I had anticipated that this question would arise, I sought external legal advice on it last night and I’ve had strong legal advice on it.”
Interim director general of RTÉ Adrian Lynch said it was ultimately his decision to take Ryan Tubridy off-air in the aftermath of the payments scandal.
He said he made the decision in consultation with the director of content.
Asked by Public Accounts Committee member Verona Murphy if this decision was put to RTÉ’s board, Mr Lynch said: “No.”
Ms Murphy said this had potentially exposed RTÉ to millions in compensation.
Asked if Mr Tubridy had done something wrong, Mr Lynch also said: “No.”
Asked in a follow-up question if Mr Tubridy had done nothing wrong, he added: “It’s not ‘wrong’, he has done nothing illegal. The contract Ryan Tubridy engaged with is legal.”
Asked if there was a difference, Mr Lynch said: “There is a difference.”
Ms Murphy had said the action to take Mr Tubridy off-air had “ruined” his reputation.
RTÉ board chair Siún Ní Raghallaigh said it was not the responsibility of the board to get involved in editorial decisions.
RTÉ’s chief financial officer Richard Collins said there were transactions at a cost of €111,000 to the barter account for travel and hotels to facilitate bringing clients to the Rugby World Cup in 2019. He did not name the clients.
He said 10-year IRFU tickets were purchased with a cost through the barter account of €138,000.
In addition, there were transactions relating to the Champions League final in 2019 totalling €26,000.
RTÉ chair Ms Ní Raghallaigh said this was “outrageous” and should go through a procurement process.
Mr Collins said taxpayers were potentially defrauded in the process of payments made to Mr Tubridy.
RTÉ’s chief financial officer said there was “concealment” or “deception” in some payments for the presenter.
He said RTÉ had been given legal advice not to call the transactions “fraud”.
However, he said: “My own opinion is, maybe, the taxpayer was defrauded.”
The committee was told that it is possible the undisclosed payments issue had had a bearing on Mr Tubridy’s decision to step down as the host of The Late Late Show in March.
Adrian Lynch, interim director general of RTÉ, had previously told the committee that based on the timeline, he did not believe it was linked to him stepping down.
“So what I’d actually done was trying to work out the day the director of content had told me that Ryan Tubridy had come into his office to tell him that he was stepping down. So, I went back and checked my email because I’d sent him an email with a list of potential presenters and that was on, I think, it was March 13th,” Mr Lynch said.
“So, in my mind, I didn’t realise that actually the CFO had had contact from the auditors on – whatever it was – March 10th or whatever. So, just to clarify that.”
Sinn Féin TD John Brady asked: “Okay, so Ryan Tubridy could well have been informed by somebody that this process or these concerns had been raised?”
Mr Lynch said: “Based on the information from yesterday, it’s possible.”
RTÉ's chief financial officer said he could “never be 100 per cent certain” there are no other payments to other individuals which are similar to arrangements which were made for Mr Tubridy.
However, he added: “We have very good control systems within RTÉ outside of this barter account.”
On transactions relating to Mr Tubridy, Mr Collins said he was given “comfort” in the fact credit notes in the organisation’s barter account, which were labelled as consultancy fees, had been signed off by former director general Dee Forbes.
Asked if he should have made sure he understood what the credit note was for, he said: “The credit note was approved by the director general. From a control point of view, I was happy.”
At the Public Accounts Committee, Fine Gael TD Colm Burke described the organisation’s barter account as a “slush fund”.
Mr Collins said he was not sure what his exact salary was, before stating that it was “around €200,000”.
When asked by Sinn Féin TD John Brady to state his salary, and when pushed to do so by the chair Brian Stanley, Mr Collins said: “I don’t know what my exact salary is.”
RTÉ's chief financial officer later said that it is around €200,000, plus allowances.
Chair of the Public Accounts Committee Brian Stanley asked the chief financial officer Richard Collins about whether he had concerns about invoices marked as “consultancy” services from Mr Tubridy’s agent Noel Kelly.
Mr Collins had told the committee earlier that when Deloitte raised concerns about the invoices, he asked the director general Dee Forbes about it and she said they were “consultancy invoices relating to Noel Kelly management”.
He told the committee he was told this consultancy concerned how RTÉ “structured itself and presented itself during Covid”.
“When you heard ‘Noel Kelly’ and ‘consultancy services at RTÉ’, did alarm bells not ring in your head as the chief financial officer because I failed to understand why – yes or no, did you not question that?”
“I was concerned but I knew the director general had a close relationship with Noel Kelly,” Mr Collins said.
“The transaction had occurred at this stage. I was providing an explanation as part of the audit to Deloitte,” Mr Collins said.
“Your explanation here is ridiculous,” Brian Stanley replied.
Either Noel Kelly or the director general came up with the terminology of “consultancy fees”, RTÉ’s commercial director told the committee, repeating a claim from Wednesday that she could not recall who exactly.
Geraldine O’Leary said: “It was either Noel Kelly or the director general, but I’m not sure which one. So, in the absence of being 100 per cent certain, I believe it is correct to say that I don’t remember – because I don’t.
“I have been trying to find that information since March of this year. I’ve been through the whole Grant Thornton forensic account. I have been 100 per cent honest all the way through and I told Grant Thornton that I would not make a statement I could not 100 per cent (stand over).”
She was asked about what exactly she knew about the invoices.
“I knew the invoices related to the €75,000 payment per year which I was across in year one, but not across in year two and three, but was asked to use the barter account to pay for them, so I knew what they were for,” Ms O’Leary said.
“You knew they were top-up payments for Ryan Tubridy?” Sinn Féin TD Imelda Munster suggested.
“Yes I did,” Ms O’Leary said.
“But you still went ahead with them?” Ms Munster suggested.
“I had no idea whether there was a separate agreement. I knew in year one that there was a legitimate deal with Renault where three events happened … I knew there was nothing done through a commercial partner for these invoices, but I did not know what other things Ryan Tubridy might be doing for payment – that was not discussed with me.”
The chairwoman of RTÉ’s audit and risk committee said it sought the resignation of former director-general Dee Forbes based on the findings of a report into payments to Mr Tubridy by financial services firm Grant Thornton.
Anne O’Leary said she thought the report was “significantly serious enough” to ask for her resignation.
“She decided not to reply to our letter on that. So, we then put her on suspension following a HR disciplinary approach.”
Additionally, RTÉ’s commercial director Geraldine O’Leary told the Public Accounts Committee that car company Renault was not aware the broadcaster had underwritten payments to Tubridy that were the subject of a tripartite commercial agreement.
The chair of the RTÉ board indicated the pay of executives at the public service broadcaster will be published as soon as possible.
Siún Ní Raghallaigh said publishing the salaries of the executives at RTÉ “is certainly something that we’re considering should be done”.
“One of the first things that we’re looking at is the salaries of and the payments to the top earners – and that would include the executive board. In terms of publishing those, it’s certainly something that we’re considering should be done,” she told the Public Accounts committee.
When TD James O’Connor said the salaries should be published in full, Ms Ní Raghallaigh said: “I undertake to do that”, saying it would be done “as soon as practically possible”.
When asked by Mr O’Connor about one individual having “god-like power” in terms of the airtime presenters get on the national broadcaster, Ms Ní Raghallaigh said: “That’s what we’re looking at in terms of whether we continue to deal with agents.”
Mr O’Connor said Ryan Tubridy and his agent Noel Kelly should be invited before the committee over the issue.
He also said the committee would like to hear from former director general Dee Forbes when she is well enough to attend and that a significant amount of blame “was laid at that particular door”.
In her opening statement, Ms Ní Raghallaigh apologised to the committee for an “egregious breach of trust with the public”.
She said: “I am appalled as to how payments were recorded and presented in RTÉ accounts.
“What was the motivation here? It appears to me that this was an act designed to deceive.”
She also appealed for former director-general Dee Forbes to appear before the committee when she is able to do so.
Ms Forbes had declined to appear, citing ill health.
Ms Ní Raghallaigh said the national broadcaster has cultural issues around “information silos, domineering hierarchies that shun transparency and foster bureaucracy”.
She added: “This series of events has revealed grave failings in internal controls at RTÉ.
“Nothing less than an overhaul of such controls and work practices will now suffice, and the board will oversee this process.”
She also said there should be a review of the highest paid members at the organisation.
RTÉ's interim director general Adrian Lynch said the next boss of RTÉ will reconstitute the national broadcaster’s executive.
Mr Lynch also said the broadcaster’s executive failed in its collective responsibility over the misstating of payments to Mr Tubridy.
“I wish to state again our deep regret regarding what has emerged in recent days. For this serious breach of trust with the public, we apologise.
“It is a fact that the application of governance procedures at executive board level allowed for the partial and incomplete sharing of information, so that individual members of the executive either did not have access to information, or had information withheld from them.
“It is true that the Executive Board failed in its responsibility to act as a collective, and failed to ensure good governance in this matter.
“Collectively, owing to the siloed style of procedures at executive, and an overreliance on the prerogative asserted by the director-general, we did not receive a comprehensive evaluation of Ryan Tubridy’s contract in full, including the way in which the payments were treated.
“We acknowledge and accept this failure by those members of the Executive who were aware of the contract. I have spoken to (incoming director-general) Kevin Bakhurst last night. I understand that his first task will be a reconstitution of the executive board of RTÉ.”
The secretary general at the Department of Media told the committee that RTÉ needs to give a “full account” of all circumstances which led up to misstated payments to Mr Tubridy.
Katherine Licken said an external review into RTÉ will examine whether its current governance framework is “fit for purpose”.
“The review will also consider RTÉ’s organisational culture and its impact on levels of trust, governance, transparency and communications, and on changes which should be made.”
The details of the terms of reference have yet to be finalised.