Trust is hard to regain
The first email dropped into inboxes at just after 3pm on Thursday. It was of course about the undeclared payments of €345,000 made to presenter Ryan Tubridy. The initial RTÉ statement revealed that "an issue was identified in relation to the transparency of certain payments” in late March. It was in March too, that Ryan Tubridy revealed that he was planning to quit as host of ‘The Late Late Show’ after 14 years.
On Monday, RTÉ Director General and Cork woman Dee Forbes announced that she had resigned with immediate effect.“As Director General, I am the person ultimately accountable for what happens within the organisation. I am deeply sorry for what has happened and my part in this episode and for that I apologise unreservedly.” She said that detailed discussions around Ryan Tubridy's pay were held with other RTÉ senior executives. She did not add who they might be and says she did not act contrary to any advice.
On Tuesday afternoon came a statement from Interim Deputy Director General Adrian Lynch. “No member of the RTÉ executive board, other than the director general, had all the necessary information in order to understand that the publicly declared figures for Ryan Tubridy could have been wrong,” he said.
Yesterday Leo Varadakar said this was not credible.
With information based on a review completed by Grant Thornton, in a nine page statement statement Mr Lynch outlined details related to Tubridy’s pay from 2020 to 2022. The report found "no finding of wrongdoing" against Mr Tubridy.It will be four weeks until a second Grant Thornton report into payments in the period 2017-2019 will be completed.
It does seem convenient that the only person in RTÉ that knew about the secret payments - according to RTÉ at least, has now resigned and left.
Members of current RTÉ management faced the Oireachtas Committee on Media yesterday.
In her opening statement yesterday Siún Ní Raghallaigh, Chair RTÉ Board apologised for this “egregious breach of trust with the public”.
“I am also mindful that this committee, and others, were in the past presented with information that was simply untrue. That was a breach of trust with you, the elected members of the Oireachtas, for which we sincerely apologise. The public, RTÉ staff, and public representatives are angry and hurt. We know that our bond of trust with the public is tarnished. We know that trust is precious, and that once lost, trust is difficult to regain.”
In a time when trust in the mainstream media is at an all-time low, the loss of trust in RTÉ might be the greatest casualty in all this sorry mess.