{"id":376791,"date":"2026-01-18T11:36:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T11:36:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/376791\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T11:36:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T11:36:11","slug":"rte-boss-kevin-bakhurst-gets-it-in-neck-from-staff-as-finance-chief-exits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/376791\/","title":{"rendered":"RTE boss Kevin Bakhurst gets it in neck from staff as finance chief exits"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kevin Bakhurst has had a rough week even by RTE\u2019s standards. The director-general had to wave goodbye to his chief financial officer, Mari Hurley, after she served just 18 months in the role, after a storm of scandals that led to an overhaul of the RTE leadership team.<\/p>\n

Making matters worse, he was forced to cancel a crucial meeting with RTE staff\u2019s union representatives due to a bout of laryngitis, only to wake up on Saturday to find a motion of confidence might be tabled on his leadership.<\/p>\n

Last week Siptu, which represents more than 600 staff, discussed a vote on the director-general at a meeting of the RTE trade union group. RTE has not yet received any formal correspondence from union representatives of any intention to hold the ballot. <\/p>\n

It is understood Bakhurst could not attend a meeting due to be held on the same day with Siptu to discuss staff concerns about RTE\u2019s strategy<\/a> as he was ill and was forced to call off engagements. The meeting will now be held on Wednesday. <\/p>\n

Staff are concerned about the mooted outsourcing of various services as well as the future direction of RTE.<\/p>\n

Hurley took over as chief financial officer in August 2024 in the fallout of the Ryan Tubridy payments controversy after Richard Collins left the post. She left RTE to take up a position at Ires Reit, the private landlord.<\/p>\n

A RTE source said Hurley\u2019s exit had stoked \u201cdiscontent\u201d among staff about the dedication of senior officials.<\/p>\n

\"RTE<\/p>\n

Bakhurst speaking to staff during a demonstration on the RTE Donnybrook campus in Dublin in 2024<\/p>\n

CILLIAN SHERLOCK\/PA WIRE<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a reminder that the people at the top of the organisation, who are making the big and important decisions about the future of the organisation \u2026 don\u2019t have any long-term commitment to the organisation,\u201d they said. The source said there was a feeling among staff that they were left to \u201cpick up the pieces\u201d following high-profile departures. \u201cThe people making the big decisions are kind of hired guns. They\u2019re in and they\u2019re out, and they don\u2019t have the loyalty and the commitment to public service broadcasting that the people who built their careers around this have,\u201d they said. <\/p>\n

\u2022 Angry RTE staff reject \u20ac500 voucher offer in lieu of pay increase<\/a><\/p>\n

Another source said the biggest concern at RTE was about outsourcing. \u201cReligious programming is gone. Secondly there\u2019s Fair City and thirdly The Late Late Show. The reason this is only Siptu is that all of the jobs under threat are Siptu jobs,\u201d the source said. <\/p>\n

Patrick O\u2019Donovan, media minister, said that Hurley had made progress on financial transparency at RTE. \u201cIt was on the foot of her work that we learnt, for instance, with regard to the issue of the art at RTE, the top-up payments to widows and previous other issues, financial issues that I was able to bring to the government,\u201d he told David McCullagh on RTE Radio 1.<\/p>\n

\"Patrick<\/p>\n

Patrick Kielty, the host of RTE\u2019s The Late Late Show<\/p>\n

ANDRES POVEDA<\/p>\n

Tubridy, who was at the centre of the controversy that prompted the shake-up at Montrose to clean up RTE\u2019s finances, broke his silence on the affair. He revealed that he attended therapy in the aftermath of the scandal. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think if I had my head screwed on better\u2026 I would have shouted louder. I accept that, and to those who are annoyed, I hope that gives some class of an answer. I do care but I can\u2019t take the blame for the entire organisation,\u201d he told The Irish Times.<\/p>\n

Tubridy announced he was launching a YouTube series, called The Late Show.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kevin Bakhurst has had a rough week even by RTE\u2019s standards. The director-general had to wave goodbye to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":376792,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[96,391,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-376791","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-tv","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=376791"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376791\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/376792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=376791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=376791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=376791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}