The Public Accounts Committee has recommended that RTÉ return under the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General, as part of a report into governance and oversight at the broadcaster.
In a statement, the PAC said that decisions at the broadcaster demonstrated a “lack of rigorous financial controls and failure of governance which damaged public trust”.
The committee has also questioned the “accounting practices in place at RTÉ, given that it published the earnings of its 10 most highly paid presenters, with such a significant understatement of earnings in the case of its most highly paid presenter”.
“In light of the evidence presented to the committee, any objective assessment could not discount the possibility that the figures were deliberately misrepresented by RTÉ,” the report into into governance and oversight said.
The committee called on the broadcaster to publish in its annual report the exact amounts paid to members of staff who receive lump sums of more than €150,000 upon their departure from the organisation.
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Another PAC recommendation is that RTÉ put in place a clear methodology in relation to how it enters into exit arrangements with staff, that these are subject to board oversight, with clear communication to the Minister, recorded in writing.
It calls for the broadcaster to ensure that future exit deals with staff “do not contain any confidentiality clauses and include a clause that the former employee cooperate with any internal or external inquiries or investigations, including Oireachtas committees”.
PAC Chair Brian Stanley said the committee identified “a number of common threads” in RTÉ, including a “general lack of transparency and accountability to the appointed board and to the minister”.
He said the under-reporting of former Late Late Show host Ryan Tubridy’s earnings “seriously undermined trust in RTE”.
The operation of the barter account “gave rise to serious risk,” he said, adding that the lack of recorded approval of the board for Toy Show The Musical shows a disregard for governance.
“RTÉ has badly, badly, mismanaged classification of a significant number of workers” for PRSI purposes which could cost tens of millions of euro.
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Among other key recommendations made by the committee are that RTÉ ensures that no side deals akin to that agreed to with Mr Tubridy are undertaken going forward.
It calls on the broadcaster to introduce a written policy in relation to negotiations with presenters and their representatives, as well as a policy for its staff in relation to promotional work and use of social media.
It also recommends that the Audit and Risk Committee at RTÉ be “sufficiently equipped” to ensure it can effectively monitor and audit internally, report within the company and that it can make recommendations to improve financial controls at the broadcaster.
Committee members also want RTÉ to provide them with an update in June 2024 on the investigation by the Department of Social Protection into the historic PRSI classification of workers at the broadcaster.
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Mr Stanley said that the recommendations “need to be implemented in full”, as “it looks like we’re going to finally get there” on a new funding model for RTÉ.
“If they feel they have good reason that some of the 21 recommendations shouldn’t be implemented, I want to hear them, and I think the other 11 members of the committee want to hear them, and we want to hear a damn good reason why not,” he said.
The practices that “led to the scandal at RTE” must not “re-emerge”.
“This is our best shot” at putting the company on a firm footing, he said.
Mr Stanley said that this is a “forward-looking report”, any future exit agreements should not have confidentiality clauses and “people who are on those types of salaries shouldn’t expect them”.
“I don’t think the public would tolerate it.”
Speaking on RTÉ’s News at One, Mr Stanley said: “What we are looking for is that there is a report on progress by June of this year.”
He said the broadcaster is a “commercial semi-state company”.
“The minister and the Government are the sole shareholders on behalf of the public,” he said.
“It is important that these matters are put in order and that we have a framework there so RTÉ can adhere to it and move on,” he added.
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Social Democrats TD Catherine Murphy said some “bog standard” measures were not carried out by RTÉ.
She said there “should be clear rules in how the assets of RTÉ are used”, adding that the committee is “trying to be helpful in this report”.
Mr Dillon said executives in RTÉ “were unsure what was actually happening” around individuals taking on promotional work, or who was undertaking it.
“So that was certainly alarming from our perspective,” the Fine Gael TD said.
The register of interests is in place in News and Current Affairs, he noted, but this “should be widespread within the organisation”.
Independent TD Verona Murphy said that the committee is not asking for people’s names to be published in relation to the publication of salaries of those over €150,000.
“It would be anonymised. It would be the salary position that we are interested in.”
“This is where we need to see transparency, we are not looking for the names of the people, we are looking for the salary positions to be you know detailed, and that to me with public money is essential.”
Meanwhile, a Fianna Fáil TD claimed that the failure of former RTÉ chief financial officer Breda O’Keeffe to appear before the committee “frustrated” their work.
“The committee is of the belief,” Paul McAuliffe read from the report, “that Ms O’Keeffe’s refusal to attend frustrated the work of the committee in resolving certain conflicts of evidence presented to it.”
“The conclusions are as important as the recommendations,” he said of the committee’s report as it gathers together various elements of the “saga”.
The National Union of Journalists has said it supports the move to bring RTÉ under the remit of the Comptroller and Auditor General.
NUJ Irish Secretary Séamus Dooley called for the “publication of the two expert reports on Governance and Workplace Culture as soon as possible to expedite the implementation of organisational and cultural change in the public service broadcaster”.
Meanwhile, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said one of the biggest issues facing RTÉ is irregular self-employment, including PRSI that might not have been paid to the State.
He told Fine Gael TDs and Senators that there may be other financial implications.
