{"id":297528,"date":"2026-02-14T09:43:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T09:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/297528\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T09:43:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T09:43:08","slug":"it-feels-like-an-increasingly-neutered-organisation-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/297528\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018It feels like an increasingly neutered organisation\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

At RT\u00c9<\/a>\u2019s Montrose campus, the mood is brittle. After a spate of leaving parties for the 67 employees who accepted a voluntary exit offer late last year, 2026 so far has been dogged by the dread that other colleagues will be redeployed or will leave too.<\/p>\n

The shrinking of the national broadcaster has begun, with consequences for those who still work for it and for almost every aspect of how RT\u00c9 fulfils its remit.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are still only at base camp,\u201d says one recently departed employee of management\u2019s plans. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe all feel a bit rudderless, really,\u201d is how a senior journalist sums up sentiment among newsroom staff. \u201cRole suppression\u201d is a term overstretched workers have come to resent.<\/p>\n

Such is the discontent that trade union Siptu<\/a>, which represents more than 600 of RT\u00c9\u2019s 1,750-plus employees, is balloting members, asking them to state whether or not they are confident that A New Direction, the 2025-2029 strategy for reshaping the broadcaster, will deliver a fit-for-purpose public service media organisation for Ireland.<\/p>\n

What will be left of RT\u00c9 in 2030? And how will the strategy \u2013 unveiled by director general Kevin Bakhurst<\/a> amid plummeting licence fee revenues and Government pressure to slash operating costs \u2013 change how public media is made and consumed in Ireland?<\/p>\n

The RT\u00c9 boss envisages that by 2030 it will employ \u201caround 1,400 people\u201d, spread mostly between the newer Stage 7 building at Montrose and an expanded presence in Cork, where it is \u201clooking at things as basic as new electrics\u201d to make its studios fit for the 21st century.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0RT\u00c9 outlines importance of State funding as TV licence sales down for sixth year in a rowOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

RT\u00c9 employed 1,853 people at the start of 2025. Alongside the 67 exits under the voluntary scheme, 30 people who retired or resigned last year were not replaced. Bakhurst, whose contract expires in mid-2030, hopes to secure Government approval for a second voluntary redundancy scheme this year and will ask for flexibility on the savings it must make on each departure \u2013 a change that will allow more people to leave. <\/p>\n

In December, at a hearing of the Oireachtas culture committee, Bakhurst denied that RT\u00c9 plans to outsource all production except news and current affairs, saying radio and sport would also remain in-house.<\/p>\n

Employees fear that not much else will, and that – unit by unit, programme by programme – RT\u00c9 is being stripped back, effectively to what\u2019s known as a publisher-broadcaster. \u201cThe horses have bolted and stampeded over content already,\u201d says one staff member.<\/p>\n

\"RTÉRT\u00c9 HQ in Montrose, Dublin. Photograph: Gareth Chaney\/Collins Photos <\/p>\n

Next stop: Fair City. A feasibility study to establish a new production model for the soap opera is under way, with an industry expert installed at Montrose to devise a \u201cbasic spec\u201d for making it. RT\u00c9 says it intends to share this with independent companies later this spring, though change is unlikely before 2028, as a new set must be built.<\/p>\n

Uncertainty lingers over this key element of the strategy, with actors union Equity, an affiliate of Siptu, saying its members are \u201cnone the wiser\u201d about the future.<\/p>\n

It was in June 2024 that Bakhurst first told staff that production of Fair City and The Late Late Show would move off site, and that they would either be \u201c100 per cent independently produced\u201d or made under a hybrid model by an in-house team and external crew.<\/p>\n

This, he said, was \u201cnot to save money\u201d, but because RT\u00c9 could not afford the \u201cprohibitive\u201d investment its facilities required to meet environmental standards that will apply to public buildings from 2030. It has received an estimate of \u201cmore than \u20ac350 million\u201d for a revamp of the dated Montrose buildings, five of which are listed as protected structures.<\/p>\n

Staff question why environmental standards are being used to usher in more outsourcing. They know that if these changes are to be introduced, it will represent a big acceleration in RT\u00c9\u2019s shift to independent production. <\/p>\n

That shift that has the imprimatur of the Government, which will soon enact legislation compelling it to boost spending on independent commissions to 25 per cent of its public funding.<\/p>\n

The Late Late Show, first broadcast in 1962, is part of the fabric of RT\u00c9. It is produced by RT\u00c9\u2019s entertainment unit, the output of which has contracted in recent times. It no longer makes an in-house Saturday night chat show, for instance \u2013 the last was Angela Scanlon\u2019s Ask Me Anything, which ended in 2023.<\/p>\n

Aside from The Late Late proper, entertainment staff work on The Late Late Toy Show, quiz show The Money List, RT\u00c9 One\u2019s New Year\u2019s Eve programmes, the Rose of Tralee and the Eurovision Song Contest (before RT\u00c9\u2019s withdrawal<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Up for the Match was on this list, and RT\u00c9 says its in-house team has \u201cdone a fantastic job\u201d making the two summer editions of the All-Ireland finals build-up show. That praise, however, is expressed on its new commissioning brief to the independent sector. Companies that can capture the \u201cimmediacy, relevance and expertise\u201d of Up for the Match but do it \u201cin a new and unexpected way\u201d have been invited to pitch for the contract.<\/p>\n

Staff were this week advised that a scaled-back RT\u00c9 will produce little entertainment programming in-house.<\/p>\n

The outsourcing of the Lotto draws, flagged at the Oireachtas, is already the least of it. In 2025 the decision to commission \u201cChristian worship content\u201d from external companies \u2013 a move Montrose insiders drolly dubbed \u201cthe outsourcing of God\u201d \u2013 was followed by the more unsettling closure of the in-house documentary unit.<\/p>\n

\"RTÉRT\u00c9 staff fear that programme by programme, RT\u00c9 is being stripped back to what\u2019s known as a publisher broadcaster. Illustration: Cathal O\u2019Gara; photographs by Alan Betson, Dara Mac D\u00f3naill, Andres Poveda, Damien Eagers, Naoise Culhane and RT\u00c9 <\/p>\n

Opponents of that shutdown say independent companies \u2013 or, as they put it, private ones \u2013 do not have the resources to take on the same degree of editorial risk and that without an in-house unit it will be harder for RT\u00c9 to show \u201creactive\u201d documentaries with quick turnaround times.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think the seriousness of the decision by RT\u00c9 to stop making documentaries has hit home with the public or with politicians,\u201d says Emma O Kelly, RT\u00c9 education correspondent, who chairs the Dublin broadcasting branch of the National Union of Journalists (NUJ).<\/p>\n

Like others in RT\u00c9\u2019s group of trade unions, she is dismayed by what she sees as the exploitation of its corporate governance crises \u2013 which included the failure under former director general Dee Forbes<\/a> to disclose payments made to presenter Ryan Tubridy<\/a> \u2013 to justify making public funding \u201ccontingent on RT\u00c9 slashing and outsourcing\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cKevin Bakhurst and the senior management team are doing what the Government has told them to do,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201c[He] won\u2019t be here forever, but what will be left behind by all the people implementing these cuts will be a hollowed-out public service media.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over in RT\u00c9\u2019s 1960s administration building, the director general is recovering from a bout of laryngitis as he fulfils a round of interview requests.<\/p>\n

The former RT\u00c9 news boss, who returned to Montrose in July 2023 as its scandals were blazing, says he has not applied for the vacant top job at the BBC, though he has also been linked with a mooted deputy director general role. Will he be at RT\u00c9 in six months\u2019 time?<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope so. Unless I do anything wrong,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The Irish Times asks why Siptu is running its confidence motion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know why they\u2019re doing it. Well, look, I do know. It\u2019s because, I think, they can see the strategy is being implemented now, and while a lot of people buy into it and understand it, there are, of course, some people who are worried about it or concerned about it or anxious about their own jobs. The unions are there to represent them, and that\u2019s fair enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bakhurst rejects the idea that a smaller RT\u00c9 equates to a \u201chollowed-out\u201d one, a phrase not only used by unions but also by a group of more than 50 media academics calling for the protection of RT\u00c9 as part of the State\u2019s \u201cdemocratic infrastructure\u201d.<\/p>\n

Change is \u201cnot uncommon\u201d for public service broadcasters, Bakhurst says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis strategy is about ensuring the long-term success and viability of RT\u00c9 as an organisation. We could not carry on doing things the way we did them for years, the same size as we were for years.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"DirectorDirector general of RT\u00c9 Kevin Bakhurst.
\nPhotograph: Laura Hutton <\/p>\n

His statement to the Oireachtas committee that RT\u00c9 will keep news and current affairs, radio and sport in-house doesn\u2019t mean other areas of programming are \u201cnot going to be here\u201d, he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome areas will be doing less. Everyone is having to make savings.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Kevin Bakhurst: \u2018For many years the level of presenter pay at RT\u00c9 got a little bit out of control\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone\u201d includes news and current affairs. Some employees report the existence of \u201ctwo RT\u00c9s\u201d \u2013 the newsroom, and everything else. But though the newsroom is officially protected from outsourcing, it is not immune to downsizing, with last year\u2019s axing of debate show Upfront with Katie Hannon allowing RT\u00c9 to suppress some roles.<\/p>\n

More RT\u00c9 journalists applied for redundancy than were given exit offers in 2025. Bakhurst says the next scheme could facilitate more departures, but this will be challenging.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people in the newsroom work extremely hard, so if you\u2019re going to lose people from news and current affairs, you have to make some choices about the way people work, or programmes, or whatever. You can\u2019t just do that overnight,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not cutting the Six One or anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for sport, RT\u00c9 says \u201cthe balance and the weight\u201d of output will be made in-house. In an age of splintered on-demand viewing, the popularity of live sport is a lifeline for national broadcasters. Still, the rights don\u2019t come cheap, and from 2018 to 2024, the proportion of RT\u00c9\u2019s television budget spent on sport swelled from 20 per cent to 28 per cent.<\/p>\n

So what happens if RT\u00c9 is outbid? \u201cYou win some and you lose some, but if we lose sports rights, we\u2019ll move the money into other types of programming,\u201d Bakhurst says.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Sunday Game host Jacqui Hurley. Photograph: Ray McManus\/Sportsfile <\/p>\n

How much money RT\u00c9 will have in the near future is unclear. The guaranteed three-year public funding secured under its 2024 deal with the Government broke down into \u20ac225 million in 2025, \u20ac240 million this year and \u20ac260 million in 2027.<\/p>\n

This generated a headline-making \u20ac725 million figure. But the total was less than RT\u00c9 had sought and less than the media regulator, Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n, had recommended it receive. In the absence of any licence fee reform, question marks hover over the final two years of Bakhurst\u2019s plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cVery early discussions\u201d have taken place, and Bakhurst says RT\u00c9 will not ask for more than \u20ac260 million, perhaps adjusted for inflation, in 2028 and 2029 \u2013 though under proposed legislative amendments it will fall to Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n to recommend funding levels for RT\u00c9 and TG4 to Minister for Culture Patrick O\u2019Donovan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This year RT\u00c9 expects to spend \u20ac58 million on independent commissions, up from \u20ac50 million in 2025, meaning it is nearing the 25 per cent figure stipulated in the Broadcasting Amendment Bill. RT\u00c9 is adamant that more commissioning will not lead to a weakening of its mission and that it is, as Bakhurst says, simply a \u201cdifferent way of doing it\u201d.<\/p>\n

He cites the higher number of documentary hours it will air in 2026: 75, up from last year\u2019s tally of 72 (nine of which were made in-house). RT\u00c9\u2019s religious output has improved, he says, since it stopped showing a weekly Mass from its own studios and replaced it with broadcasts of \u201creal church services with real people in their own churches\u201d, produced by Scratch Films.<\/p>\n

Sustained Government support for RT\u00c9 is \u201cessential\u201d for the wider industry, says Screen Producers Ireland<\/a> (SPI). Although the independent sector\u2019s representative body is not across the details of RT\u00c9\u2019s plans for Fair City and The Late Late, SPI chief executive Susan Kirby notes that RT\u00c9 will continue to provide editorial oversight, just as it does with all independently produced programmes.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would not anticipate that viewers should expect a dramatic change in tone or in the core identity of these shows,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Independent producers \u2013 the term used in legislation and across the industry \u2013 \u201calready make many of the most loved and acclaimed programmes\u201d, Kirby says.<\/p>\n

\"SiobhánSiobh\u00e1n McSweeney, presenter of Traitors Ireland <\/p>\n

The Traitors Ireland, made and brought to RT\u00c9 by Dublin-based Kite Entertainment, is one example. The success of the reality competition show energised people at Montrose, says a senior journalist. \u201cThere was very little begrudgery about it. It was done to a high standard, and everybody enjoyed it.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the Irish Film Institute last month, optimism also prevailed at a screening of These Sacred Vows, the Tenerife-set RT\u00c9 drama now showing on Sunday nights, with parasols and paddleboards adorning a photoshoot backdrop bearing the tagline \u201cgreat local drama\u201d.<\/p>\n

The first episode yielded poor reviews<\/a>, but there is perhaps more promising material to come, including Tall Tales & Murder from Love\/Hate writer Stuart Carolan and the possible return of Kin. Dermot Horan, RT\u00c9 director of acquisitions and co-productions, has been making calls to try to revive the well-watched gangster drama, which was derailed by financial woes at its Canadian backer.<\/p>\n

International coproductions are the norm for drama other than soaps. RT\u00c9 is not alone in no longer being able to finance the genre by itself. It is airing more hours of \u201clocal drama\u201d than it did a decade ago. But the industry landscape has led to a dearth of the type of \u201cstate-of-the-nation\u201d scripted television that does not readily sell overseas.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ecology of the media has changed hugely over the last 20 or 30 years and RT\u00c9 is a diminished part of that,\u201d says Willie O\u2019Reilly, who was group commercial director for six years from 2012.<\/p>\n

It has no choice but to cut back, he says. \u201cWe used to joke about it. \u2018We are getting littler.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

O\u2019Reilly queries why the Government has not increased the \u20ac160 licence fee for 18 years. \u201cWith what other element of the public service would you expect not to get a price increase?\u201d<\/p>\n

One ramification of this stasis \u2013 a decline in real terms \u2013 is that RT\u00c9 relies more on commercial revenues than its counterparts across Europe. This left it exposed in the wake of the 2008 economic crisis, when advertising income plunged.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not saying there is no public service mission in RT\u00c9 \u2013 there absolutely is \u2013 but it has always been conditioned, I think, by an eye on the commercial bottom line,\u201d says Roddy Flynn, associate professor at DCU School of Communications.<\/p>\n

\u201cRT\u00c9 is still a very influential space for voices that want to be heard, but it just feels like an increasingly neutered organisation.\u201d<\/p>\n

What [Bakhurst] has allowed happen in radio is very problematic<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0A senior figure in current affairs<\/p>\n

The battle for attention is intense, which is why Bakhurst\u2019s strategy outlines digital investments that will help RT\u00c9 reach otherwise elusive audiences. These include ongoing upgrades to the once glitch-beleaguered RT\u00c9 Player and a long-promised new audio app featuring podcast commissions. User sign-in will become mandatory on both.<\/p>\n

But because broadcasters must go in search of viewers, not just hope viewers will find them, RT\u00c9 is also devising a new plan for distributing its content on YouTube.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reality is that YouTube is the largest video platform in the world,\u201d says Muirne Laffan, who was chief digital officer of RT\u00c9 until 2017.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing that is different now is that it is such an international world. It\u2019s a very fragmented, global ecosystem. But the media has always evolved. There\u2019s no certainty with regard to the future. Change is to be expected.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some detect a waning of RT\u00c9\u2019s influence in this fragmented era, even in news and current affairs, where it still commands strong loyalty and trust.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe segmentation of the media has reduced the audience and the importance of television news, radio news, Morning Ireland,\u201d says Ray Burke, former chief news editor for RT\u00c9. \u201cThey are just not as important as they were. And that\u2019s a trend I don\u2019t see changing.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"DirectorDirector general of RT\u00c9 Kevin Bakhurst. Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill <\/p>\n

At Montrose, diagnoses vary. \u201cOne thing I will say about the TV side of things is the unions are very, very powerful in RT\u00c9 and as a result it makes things very inefficient in terms of getting things done,\u201d says a senior figure in current affairs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are people who don\u2019t need to be there and who can\u2019t be fired. And if you can\u2019t fire them, then you start outsourcing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bakhurst makes himself accessible and is \u201ccertainly trying\u201d, the person adds, before criticising the handling of Radio 1\u2019s recent reshuffle. \u201cWhat he has allowed happen in radio is very problematic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Others also temper positive comments about Bakhurst, with one person saying he is likable but that \u201cdistrust from the Dee Forbes era has not gone away\u201d. His potential receipt of a 20 per cent increase in his basic salary under new Government pay structures, taking it up to \u20ac300,000, is contrasted with unions\u2019 fight to receive a 6 per cent pay rise for staff over a 2\u00bd-year period.<\/p>\n

RT\u00c9 executives are aware of the state of morale. Last year\u2019s staff engagement survey revealed \u201careas that are damning\u201d, Bakhurst admits.<\/p>\n

In January he sent out a message announcing a new calendar of social activities to improve the \u201csense of community\u201d at work. Less favourably received by despairing employees was the introduction of a requirement to meet their line managers every six to eight weeks to \u201cstrengthen two-way communication\u201d.<\/p>\n

The walls tell their own story. One Siptu poster affixed to a canteen noticeboard invites workers to scan a QR code to join the union in these \u201cunprecedented times\u201d. Another advertises the electronic ballot, which closes next Tuesday. It implores members to \u201cvote no confidence\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At RT\u00c9\u2019s Montrose campus, the mood is brittle. After a spate of leaving parties for the 67 employees…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":297529,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3584,42,47232,141358,73428,43,12636,6232,6085,125027,141357,20167,40,38,41,39,4621],"class_list":{"0":"post-297528","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-coimisiun-na-mean","9":"tag-headlines","10":"tag-kevin-bakhurst","11":"tag-kite-entertainment","12":"tag-national-union-of-journalists","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-oireachtas","15":"tag-patrick-o-donovan","16":"tag-rte","17":"tag-rte-pay-controversy","18":"tag-screen-producers-ireland","19":"tag-siptu","20":"tag-top-news","21":"tag-top-stories","22":"tag-topnews","23":"tag-topstories","24":"tag-youtube"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=297528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297528\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/297529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=297528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=297528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=297528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}