COUNTING THE COST OF CONTROVERSIES

How the RTÉ licence fee payment revolt is reflected in the scandals

JUNE 2023 €263,360 lost

THE protest against the licence fee begins as RTÉ admits to paying top presenter Ryan Tubridy €345,000 more than was publicly disclosed, opening a Pandora’s box of issue. Director general Dee Forbes, right with Tubridy, resigns, after being suspended, and RTÉ managers are called in front of two separate Oireachtas committee hearings.

€3.6m lost

JULY THE revolt against the licence fee firmly takes hold as the crisis deepens in RTÉ when the public hears further revelations around €2.2million lost on Toy Show the Musical. The new RTÉ director general, Kevin Bakhurst, left, takes over to steady the ship, getting rid of former executives in the process. The scandal graces TV screens as Tubridy appears before two Oireachtas committee hearings where he calls out seven ‘untruths’ from his employer.

AUGUST €3.6m lost

THE crisis continues with a bleeding hole of revenue creating problems down the line. The fate of Tubridy’s career at RTÉ is decided when negotiations to get him back on Radio 1 are abandoned by the director general. A second independent report into Tubridy’s earnings finds he was not at fault for the misstatement of €120,000 of his pay. Instead, the report found that it was a plausible explanation that RTÉ under-declared his salary in order to keep the figure under half a million.

€4.3m lost

SEPTEMBER THE director general imposes a jobs freeze at RTÉ and a halt to all discretionary spending. RTÉ is summoned to another Oireachtas committee where Mr Bakhurst is challenged on a controversial €240,000 tender process for photographers to take pictures on the set of Fair City. The director general warns that not implementing a new longer-term funding model for public service media would jeopardise the national broadcaster’s future. He also refuses to reveal exit packages of recently departed executives.

OCTOBER €4.3m lost

MR BAKHURST announces that the former chief financial officer Richard Collins has resigned and tells the Public Accounts Committee that RTÉ would become insolvent by spring 2024 without a Government bailout. After resistance to PAC’s request, RTÉ is forced to hand over a note from a meeting between Dee Forbes and Tubridy’s agent Noel Kelly, left, where she agreed that RTÉ would underwrite the commercial agreement which formed part of his salary boost, at a time when other staff at the national broadcaster were taking pay cuts. Media Minister Catherine Martin warns that the fall in licence fee revenue could cost RTÉ €61million over 2023 and 2024.

NOVEMBER €2.4m lost

MR BAKHURST outlines his strategic plan for RTÉ which includes €10million of cost-cutting and a reduction in headcount at the station by 400 over four years. The plan means fewer Fair City episodes per week and other programmes will be postponed to save cash. Mr Bakhurst says that no one at the broadcaster will earn more than the DG, imposing a €250,000 salary cap. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, right, says the reform of the TV licence has been made harder by the recent payments controversy at RTÉ – and pours cold water over the idea that it may be replaced with a household media charge. The cost of three reviews into RTÉ’s finances by Grant Thornton amounts to almost €500,000 so far. Tubridy moves on from his time at the broadcaster, with the announcement of his new gig on Virgin Radio in the UK in the new year.

DECEMBER €1.2m lost

RTÉ’S haemorrhaging of cash slows with a successful Late Late Toy Show, with the new frontman Patrick Kielty, left, on presenting duties. Reviews conducted into Toy Show The Musical and voluntary exit packages at RTÉ are delayed until the new year. Mr Bakhurst reveals that he has revised the pay of some high earners downwards, as part of his plan to reduce the size of the largest wage packets.

JANUARY 2024 €502,960 lost

THE first few weeks of the year were largely scandal-free for RTÉ with Oliver Callan, right, announced as Tubridy’s radio replacement on a salary of €150,000. However, the end of the month brings revelations over the Toy Show musical, with RTÉ’s independent report into the fiasco published. It finds there was no board approval for the project that lost €2.2million and there were never enough tickets on sale for the station to break even on the venture. A report into voluntary exit programmes at RTÉ found that a redundancy package for former chief financial officer Breda O’Keeffe was not compliant with the scheme and was founded on a business case by Ms O’Keeffe herself that never materialised.

FEBRUARY €1.6m lost

CONTROVERSY spikes again for the national broadcaster as politicians call for those named in the Toy Show musical report – which had been redacted – to be revealed. RTÉ is hauled before the Oireachtas Media Committee where Mr Bakhurst reveals that Ms O’Keeffe’s exit payment was €450,000. He also let slip that Rory Coveney, the former head of strategy who was the ‘driving force’ behind the Toy Show musical, also left on an exit package – after RTÉ said he had resigned.

Minister Catherine Martin calls both the director general and the chair of RTÉ, Siún Ní Raghallaigh, before her to demand transparency around exit packages. The chair tells the minister that the board had no role in Mr Collins’s exit package – but later clarifies that she misinformed the minister and the board did indeed sign off. Minister Martin, left, refuses to say in a live Prime Time interview that she has confidence in Ms Ní Raghallaigh and the chair resigns just hours later, issuing a public notice on her resignation just before 1am on a Friday night.