RTÉ staff will suffer in the end

THERE’S little doubt at this stage that the former RTÉ director general, Dee Forbes, will not be available, for medical reasons, to attend the Oireachtas committee hearings into the ongoing disaster at the national broadcaster.

This is unfortunate, for obvious reasons, as Ms Forbes is ideally placed to answer the many questions about how

RTÉ managed to implode through a series of self-inflicted screw-ups made possible by a glaring abandonment of anything resembling good governance.

But Ms Forbes’ unavailability doesn’t mean the Oireachtas committee is prevented from reaching the most reliable conclusions based on facts that are now freely available after a series of investigations.

This week’s McCann Fitzgerald report into voluntary redundancy packages in 2017 and 2021 exposes a frightful lack of proper corporate control, particularly in respect of the exit deal done with the station’s former chief financial officer, Breda O’Keeffe. That deal was not presented to the RTÉ executive board for approval as required.

All of which comes as no surprise following jawdropping disclosures of previously unrevealed payments to Ryan Tubridy, tricking about with accounts, and massive losses on the infamous Toy Show musical.

This series of calamities at RTÉ needs to end. We all know by now the mess the place is in after years of bad governance. The hope is that everything is now out in the open. Because only then can new director general Kevin Bakhurst and his team start the process of straightening the place out.

That’ll result in a slimmeddown RTÉ, with hundreds leaving the organisation. It’s hard to imagine that all that can be achieved through voluntary exits. Workers who played no hand, act or part in this debacle will now be forced to pay the heaviest price for it, in the loss of their jobs.