The Fianna Fáil senator Mr Terry Leyden has apologised to RTÉ's health correspondent, Aileen O'Meara, after he accused her in the Seanad of "controlling" the Government's health policy.
Mr Leyden made a personal statement to the Seanad yesterday, just before it adjourned for the Christmas holiday, in which he said he withdrew any remarks which might have caused offence to Ms O'Meara.
He had been urged to withdraw the remarks by the managing editor of RTÉ's news division, Mr Cillian de Paor, and by the Irish secretary of the National Union of Journalists, Mr Seamus Dooley.
The comments were unfair and unsubstantiated, Mr de Paor said.
After receiving Mr de Paor's letter, he said in the Seanad on December 11th that RTÉ was "always biased on issues of health" and that it was attempting to censor, intimidate, blacklist and muzzle him.
Mr Leyden referred yesterday to comments he made on October 22nd in which he said that "every time there is someone on a trolley, we have Aileen O'Meara or someone else from RTÉ coming on the scene".
He noted that he had described Ms O'Meara as "a respected journalist" at that time.
He said his other remarks about Ms O'Meara "were meant only to justify the assertion made during the debate that RTÉ and the Dublin-based media in general have an undue influence on how policy is determined regarding the health services to the detriment of the medical needs of the west of Ireland".
He went on: "In the course of making that point, if any remarks in any way caused offence to Ms Aileen O'Meara, who is a very well-respected and competent journalist with RTÉ, I withdraw them and apologise to her."
After naming Ms O'Meara, Mr Leyden was told on October 22nd that he was not allowed to name individuals who were not in the chamber. But he went on to say: "They may not be here but they are well represented here, and the party with whom they are involved is well represented in this House. "If they want to defend it, so be it."
Mr de Paor said there was a clear implication that Ms O'Meara was biased and that such bias was political because her sister, Ms Kathleen O'Meara, is a Labour Party senator.
Noting that Mr Leyden had spoken under Oireachtas privilege, Mr de Paor said the senator was seeking publicity for himself.