Writing about RTÉ almost 20 years ago in his book RTÉ and the Globalisation of Irish Television (2004), Farrell Corcoran – who was chairman of the RTÉ Authority from 1995 to 2000 – outlined what he regarded as the centrality of RTÉ to national identity. RTÉ, he argued, “has played a major role in dominating the symbolic environment in which Irish people construct their sense of identity and weave the common sense that underpins the everyday life of the community. RTÉ's social role has been to find ways of narrating the social that makes sense of their society for viewers and listeners.”
That assertion is of course debatable, but such argumentation has always been apparent in relation to RTÉ, reflecting the varied and strong feelings as to what constitutes its mission and approach. The last few months have seen intensification of such debate and related matters of funding and transparency, adding more potency to the stated rationale for Corcoran’s book: “RTÉ's work is frequently shrouded in secrecy and mystique, which means conspiracy theories abound about how it is governed and how it relates to various power centres in Irish life.”
It is appropriate that the Dáil’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) investigates RTÉ spending on behalf of the taxpayer. It is also possible, however, for the PAC to go beyond its brief and engage in rhetoric that seems less about financial overview and more about grandstanding that can muddy the waters between politics and broadcasting. It can also make RTÉ's problems worse, particularly for a current director general, Kevin Bakhurst, dealing with the fallout from a crisis not of his making and plunging licence revenue.
As a member of the PAC during the most recent grilling of RTÉ executives, Labour Party TD Alan Kelly made robust assertions and predictions that suggest politicians need to sort out their own boundaries when it comes to broadcasting. The issue at play was the right to legal privilege amid demands to release a key legal note about the May 2020 Tubridy Renault deal.
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Kelly said of Bakhurst that before that hearing he had done “a reasonably good job” but then spoke about him like a judge: “This is a pivotal moment for him. ” In relation to Bakhurst’s assertion that he would like to see the legal advice given to the PAC regarding the 2020 note, Kelly said he was being “too confrontational . . . this is not a two-way relationship . . . this is the Oireachtas. We’re the elected representatives. We are the people who vote to decide whether we give you money. The taxpayers are watching this so Mr Bakhurst does not get to see our legal advice . . . there is a moral issue here . . . If we end up in a scenario whereby we have to compel this and it could end up in the courts, Mr Bakhurst’s position will not be tenable.”
Kelly was wrong; it is a two-way relationship and it is not the role of PAC members to become moral arbiters or to dictate Bakhurst’s future position or otherwise in RTÉ, or to use what can reasonably be interpreted as threats to withhold funding.
The independence of the State broadcaster from the Government has been an issue since its foundation. Fianna Fáil had a tense relationship with the fledgling broadcaster in the 1960s and some of its members, including Charles Haughey, rubbished the idea of its right to editorial independence. A dispute over equal billing being given to protesting farmers and Haughey as minister for agriculture on RTÉ in 1966 led to taoiseach Seán Lemass telling the Dáil that RTÉ “was set up by legislation as an instrument of public policy and as such is responsible to the Government . . . the Government reject the view that RTÉ should be, whether generally or in regard to its current affairs and news programmes, completely independent of Government supervision”.
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Censorship, especially section 31 of the Broadcasting Act prohibiting interviews with those deemed to be promoting organisations encouraging violence, was also controversial the following decade as the Troubles raged. In more recent times, RTÉ has faced numerous legal actions from politicians, leading to undue caution or avoidance, or broadcasters constantly caveating and adding qualifications to their assertions.
The exposure of siloed management, failures of financial oversight and the misleading of the public by RTÉ should not be used as an opportunity for politicians to compound the angst and make further non-payment of the licence fee likely. The organisation is in enough trouble without politicians feasting on its carcass. The general welfare of public broadcasting matters greatly, including that which is not profitable but performs vital social and cultural functions. Far away from the RTÉ world of barter accounts, agents and high-profile stars, there is an RTÉ in which much more modestly remunerated public servants generate high-quality programmes for radio and television. They are much less likely to be made by those without a public service remit.