The Tanaiste has criticised an apparent “upstairs-downstairs” situation at RTE as station bosses are to be brought before the Department of Communications following a fresh payment controversy.
Communications Minister Patrick O’Donovan is due to meet with RTE bosses on Tuesday evening after it was revealed that Derek Mooney has been at least its ninth highest-paid presenter since 2020 – but had not featured in annual lists as he was classified as a producer.
He has also said he wanted to “flesh out” why RTE paid Claire Byrne and Ray D’Arcy almost 100,000 euro after they left Radio One.
Meanwhile, the Comptroller and Auditor General is to be given responsibility to examine RTE under legislation approved by the Government.
Mr O’Donovan secured Cabinet approval to publish a Bill to “enhance transparency, accountability and value-for-money” in RTE and TG4.
The Bill would also ensure any European works levy on streaming services may only be imposed by Coimisiun na Mean following a ministerial direction.
Mr O’Donovan said: “RTE needs to demonstrate the very highest standards of corporate governance.
“To that end, the Bill will strengthen the legislative underpinning for the governance of both RTE and TG4.”
Speaking to reporters before Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting, Tanaiste Simon Harris said: “I think there’s a lot of hard work and decent people in RTE who will feel let down by this latest set of revelations.”
He added: “I don’t want to push to personalise it to anyone, because I think that serves no purpose, but it’s beginning to look like there’s a little bit of an upstairs-downstairs situation going on in RTE, that certain producers can be over here, and that’s not fair. It’s not fair in any organisation.
“So, there’s a fairness issue here, there’s a transparency issue here, and then there’s just an accuracy issue here, fairness, transparency and accuracy. And we need all three of them to ensure we don’t have Groundhog Day.”
Mr Harris said a lack of transparency was not acceptable to the Irish public as he criticised a “drip-feed” of information.
He added: “None of this ‘will there be another revelation?’, no salacious detail – we just need facts, information and transparency.”
Mr O’Donovan said he expected to get “clarity” from RTE in the meeting and to find out who to blame in the wake of the further financial issues.
Ahead of a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday morning, he said: “We’ve been down this road before, and here we are again.”
He said RTE staff are “very aggrieved” and that he had received anonymous correspondence from staff at the broadcaster.
“There is a lot of hurt in the organisation because people thought this is the end of it, and clearly it is not.”
He said there cannot be a “vacuum” in the company and that they cannot have a “relationship built on revelation”.
Mr O’Donovan criticised the “recategorisation” of Mr Mooney as a producer, adding: “It’s a very fancy word – I don’t know if the public will understand it – I never heard of it until last week.”
He also questioned why RTE waited weeks to bring the matter to his department.
Taoiseach Micheal Martin said bringing RTE under the aegis of the Comptroller and Auditor General would create “a more structured framework for accountability”.
He said the revelations on Mr Mooney had created concerns, as he stressed it was “essential” to maintain confidence in the public service broadcaster.
Meanwhile, RTE has sought the expertise of consultant Sam Whipple, who worked as a “change co-ordinator” at the BBC, to examine how RTE is structured and resourced and to identify areas to “improve workflows” and “delivery” across TV, radio, online and social media.
His review started at the end of April and is expected to last 40 days.
The review was not required to be publicly tendered and it is therefore understood to cost less than 50,000 euro.
Asked about that process, Mr Harris said there were a lot of hardworking people in the broadcaster but taxpayers “quite rightly” had some concerns.
Meanwhile, Oireachtas Media Committee member Malcolm Byrne said all personnel in RTE in receipt of more than 100,000 euro in salaries or payments should have those details published annually.
RTE is due to appear before that committee on Wednesday.
