Kevin Bakhurst to contact Ryan Tubridy for discussion on future with RTÉ

RTÉ director general Kevin Bakhurst has said he will contact Ryan Tubridy within the next week to arrange several long conversations with the presenter about his future with the national broadcaster.

Mr Bakhurst has also said he will not deal with, or talk to, Tubridy’s agent, Noel Kelly.

RTÉ has been engulfed in the biggest crisis of its history since it disclosed that €345,000 in undeclared payments were made to Tubridy over several years.

The crisis has been exacerbated by Tubridy and his agent on the one side, and RTÉ executives on the other, contradicting each other’s evidence at the Oireachtas committees.

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In an interview with The Irish Times, Mr Bakhurst said he did not want to pick on Mr Kelly personally but added: “We can’t stop someone using an agent at the right point, but I can choose with whom I have conversations.”

He said there may come a point where RTE’s legal department might have to deal with the agent but that he would not speak to him.

Mr Bakhurst, who began his new role last Monday, said he needs time to step back and make a decision on a new contract for RTÉ’s highest-profile presenter but does not want the situation dragging out needlessly.

“I know from my email inbox that the opinions are divided out there. There is the number of emails I get saying, ‘Bring Back Ryan, why is he not back on air?’. I get the same number saying that Ryan has done terrible things. So these are the kinds of decisions you are never going to get 100 per cent support for but in the end, I’ve got to make the right, fair and correct decision I think for audiences, for RTÉ and for Ryan and I want to treat Ryan fairly. And I think in the end, all I can do is make the decision and explain the basis we take that on,” he said.

“I think there’s a lot of factors here. Ryan is an immensely talented broadcaster and clearly much loved by huge parts of the audience. I’ve got to judge a number of things here. One is the events of the past few weeks and the events of the last few days. But also, as I said, I want to talk to staff and I’ve already started doing that, and people who work in radio, and have worked with Ryan and other people who work in radio, and the leadership team.”

[ RTÉ boss’s baptism of fire involves deciding Ryan Tubridy’s fate ]

Decision by end July

Asked when the decision would be made, he replied that Tubridy was due to go on holiday and he himself was taking time off at the end of July and he wanted a decision before then.

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Mr Bakhurst added that he personally thought it would be the right thing to do for the presenter to return a €150,000 fee he received as part of a deal with Renault. He also said nothing should be read into his decision not to pay Tubridy’s latest invoice. He said it had not been paid because the level of payment has not yet been determined and that once it is, it would be paid retrospectively.

He said to restore confidence, RTÉ had to “absolutely demonstrate” the organisation has changed.

He said that the board met yesterday and the sense coming from the meeting was it was starting to get a grip on the situation.