The exit package for RTE’s former chief financial officer (CFO) was not considered or approved by network executives, an independent report has found.
An investigation by legal firm McCann FitzGerald found that the package offered to Breda O’Keeffe was the only case where the terms of the 2017 voluntary exit programme “were not complied with”.
The report said more than 250 applications were submitted under the 2017 programme and 176 were successful.
It also said the failure to follow the rules of the scheme rests with RTE.
“The former chief financial officer (Breda O’Keeffe) asserts that responsibility for failing to comply with the terms of the 2017 VEP rests solely with RTE and not with her. In this regard, we accept that individual applicants were not responsible for bringing their own applications to the executive board for approval,” the report said.
The report does not give the value of the exit payment, but said Ms O’Keeffe was entitled to a “redundancy lump sum” calculated under the rules of the 2017 programme.
It also said Ms O’Keeffe had requested that “her privacy and GDPR rights be respected” so it had “limited our commentary to the decision-making process in relation to her departure”.
RTE announced in July an external review into its voluntary exit programmes after the Public Accounts Committee was told the voluntary redundancy offering to Ms O’Keeffe was not signed off by every member of the broadcaster’s executive.
Another former CFO, Richard Collins, told the committee he was on the executive board when the payment to his predecessor was made but not when it was agreed, and said he “knew nothing about that package”.
Deputy director general Adrian Lynch, who was also on the executive board at the time, told the committee “it never came to us for sign-off”.
Labour TD Alan Kelly put it to RTE director general Kevin Bakhurst that the issue needed to be investigated, and Mr Bakhurst said he took the issue “seriously”.
The report, published on Thursday evening, said Ms O’Keeffe stated she had “‘no awareness’ of the assertion that her application had not been approved by the executive board”.
She also said she made her statement to the Oireachtas “in the belief that her VEP application had been approved by the executive board and that she was ‘shocked by statements made to the Oireachtas committees to this effect by RTE Executives in July 2023’”.
In a separate issue, the McCann FitzGerald investigation found that 10 applications under the 2017 programme were approved and termination payments paid but “did not… satisfy the requirements of a redundancy within the meaning of the Redundancy Payments Acts” and that Revenue needed to decide if a tax exemption should have been applied.
In relation to the 2021 exit programme, the report found that all formal applications submitted were considered consistently and all departures were in compliance with its terms.
Mr Bakhurst said: “RTE accepts the findings of the McCann Fitzgerald report, which I commissioned. The report finds that the rules of the two schemes were observed in all instances save one. I remain shocked by this serious breach of procedure – my aim continues to be the implementation of measures to ensure this cannot happen again.
“This report arrives as we near completion of a new Governance Framework for RTE, informed by ISO 3700 standards, which will enshrine best practice governance standards across the organisation.
“I am satisfied that the additional systemic protections that have been introduced over the last six months will safeguard future processes, including the broadening of the terms of reference and oversight controls of the Remuneration Committee, and stronger governance procedures at interim leadership team level.”
The RTE Trade Union Group said staff had “expressed their outrage at senior management failures” at the national broadcaster in the wake of the report.
It added: “Staff are exhausted with the relentless revelations due to shoddy governance while dealing at the same time with the challenges they now face as a consequence.
“Despite this, workers in RTE strive every day to provide quality services to the public as they try to rebuild the trust that has been lost.”
Minister for the Media Catherine Martin said that the report demonstrated “an appalling disregard for the principles of equity, fairness and transparency in the treatment of staff, which prevailed at the time”.
“Earlier today, I met the director-general, Kevin Bakhurst, and he assured me that the control and oversight reforms, introduced over the past number of months, will ensure that this will not happen again,” she said in a statement.
“The report has been forwarded to two independent Expert Advisory Committees which were commissioned by Government to carry out Reviews of Governance, Culture, and HR matters at RTE. It will help inform their work, which is ongoing, and I await their recommendations.”
According to the report, Ms O’Keeffe said she had met former RTE director general Dee Forbes about the exit package and that on September 6 2017, Ms Forbes “confirmed her support for my application to the VEP 2017, with a proposed exit date of June 2018”.
Her exit was deferred several times, the report said, until RTE’s director of human resources issued an offer letter to Ms O’Keeffe on June 13 2019, “which was in the standard form of letter issued to all successful applicants under the 2017 VEP”.
Ms O’Keeffe “signed and returned this letter, which was a legally binding agreement between her and RTE”, the report said.
Neither Ms O’Keeffe, who was CFO from 2012 to 2020, nor Ms Forbes were available for interview for the independent report.
Ms O’Keeffe did provide information for consideration during the review and responded to queries through her solicitors, the report said.
It added that Ms Forbes was “unable to participate in the review for medical reasons”, and her solicitor said she had “reserved the right to comment further on all matters when she is medically fit to do so”.
The McCann FitzGerald report said the absence of Ms Forbes’ account has inhibited its ability to understand why the application was not put before RTE executives for approval.
