RTÉ’s Shortt to earn up to ¤150k as company secretary
THE move of RTÉ’s economic correspondent Robert Shortt away from the newsroom to the position of company secretary overseeing corporate governance could earn him up to €150,000 a year.
And despite a recruitment freeze at the station, RTÉ has advertised internally to find Robert Shortt’s replacement as economics correspondent, for a salary in the region of €94,000.
Mr Shortt has left the RTÉ newsroom to take up a full-time job as company secretary at the station as it tackles governance reforms and cost-cutting measures after revelations of secret payments, barter accounts and golden handshakes.
The long-time correspondent can earn between €100,000 and €150,000 a year in his new job, with RTÉ saying it is ‘at the lower end of the published salary range’.
Former Washington correspondent Mr Shortt, right, has been RTÉ’s economics correspondent since 2019. He was also a reporter on Prime Time for a decade.
RTÉ director general Kevin Bakhurst introduced a recruitment freeze last September as part of cost-cutting measures at the station.
The company secretary job has been reinstated to a full-time position after being covered by the former head of legal affairs, Paula Mullooly, as well as her executive duties for the past six years.
Ms Mullooly left to take up a job with A&L Goodbody at the end of last year. She became head of legal at RTÉ in 2019, when she also became company secretary.
RTÉ had a full-time dedicated company secretary for seven years before that. Cillian De Paor, former head of RTÉ’s news division, served full-time as company secretary from 2012 to 2019.
A spokesman for RTÉ said: ‘The role has been restored to a fulltime position as one of the measures taken to establish the highest standards of corporate governance in RTÉ.
‘As company secretary, a position he applied for as part of the internal competition, Robert Shortt has left his position in the RTÉ newsroom. Any change to Robert Shortt’s salary is due to a different salary being allocated to the role of company secretary.’
The advert for the company secretary job stipulated that applicants must have ‘relevant work experience in a company secretarial or related role, working to tight deadlines and a third-level qualification in a related field (i.e. accounting, company law, corporate governance) or equivalent work experience.’ The essential skills list included ‘experience of dealing with senior executive or board management,’ among other requirements. Mr Shortt will report directly to the director general in his new job. The station has advertised internally for a new economics correspondent with a salary range of between €69,034 and €94,109.