Mattie McGrath says yesterday’s Oireachtas committee hearing with the RTE Board was a joke and a charade.
And a local expert has been telling Tipp FM that the broadcaster is right not to publish a list of its top one hundred earners.
The only Tipperary TD on the Oireachtas Media Committee says he didn’t attend yesterday’s hearing with the RTE Board because he thought it was a waste of time.
Mattie McGrath says it’s because it was clear they could not possibly get to the bottom of the issues at the national broadcaster.
Speaking on Tipp Today Deputy McGrath says he and the other committee members were sent far too much information to be able to properly examine because it was submitted too late.
“It was a dumping ground – dump all these reports on top of these lads, dump all the massive mounds of paper. (Director General Kevin) Bakhurst then would do most of the talking. How could I in ten minutes – how could I in a day – evaluate and look through those reports. I hadn’t got the opening statements even. How could I in my ten minutes of questioning – and remembers its five minutes questioning and maybe five minutes for answering. This is a joke, it’s a charade.
Meanwhile a local G-D-P-R expert says RTE can’t publish employee salaries.
Management at the broadcaster has told TDs that they can’t release the names of its top 100 earners and their pay as requested at a previous committee meeting.
Paula Carney Hoffler from the Irish Data Protection Association & Academy says you can’t legally even ask workers for permission to made their information public.
“There is no law in place – you can’t consent. If you’re using legitimate interest or doing an assessment you have to give the person the right to object to the processing or the right to object to having their salary shared so RTE are 100% right.”
The RTE saga is likely to rumble on with staff unhappy over the recruitment freeze announced out of the blue yesterday and ongoing financial issues after they asked for a €34 million bailout from the government.
