RTÉ's new director general has entered into the role during a full-blown crisis for the organisation.
The public service broadcaster has been reeling since it emerged last month that it under-reported the earnings of star presenter Ryan Tubridy and failed to disclose €345,000 of additional payments to him between 2017 and 2022.
The crisis has since widened amid new revelations about spending through a "slush fund" and commercial conflicts of interest, furthering shattering trust in RTÉ.
On his first day in the job, Kevin Bakhurst made the decision to "stand down" the RTÉ executive board and pledged to be "open and transparent" with staff about future changes.
So what are the immediate and long-term challenges now facing the broadcaster and its new boss?
Ryan Tubridy and top presenter pay
Public outrage over secret payments to the former Late Late Show presenter is what triggered the wider RTÉ crisis, and yet this issue remains unresolved.
Despite several weeks of statements and Oireachtas committee hearings, the full details of the arrangement are still unclear.
Criticism has focused on two €75,000 payments to Tubridy in 2021 and 2022, which bumped his total annual fee up to €515,000.
A commitment was made in 2020 that RTÉ would underwrite annual commercial payments due to Tubridy over a five-year period.
Tubridy, who is off-air from his weekday radio programme, has admitted he should have questioned the accuracy of published figures on his salary.
Former director general Dee Forbes, who resigned on June 26th, said she did not act contrary to advice in underwriting commercial fees to Tubridy during a May 2020 meeting with his agent, Noel Kelly.
Tubridy and Kelly are set to face Oireachtas committees this week – the new director general will hope their evidence brings some closure to the issue.
However, it remains unclear why RTÉ understated Tubridy's pay between 2017 and 2019 – a further external review is looking into that.
All this means the debate around presenters' earnings will be contentious for the broadcaster in the years to come.
The RTÉ top brass will be under pressure to take pay cuts or freezes – a hard sell after the revelations about Tubridy's payments.
Dee Forbes had previously pledged to reduce the fees paid to top contracted on-air presenters by 15 per cent, which was in addition to cuts of over 30 per cent agreed in previous years.
For now, Bakhurst has promised to publish the salaries of the senior executive team along with the earnings of RTÉ's 10 highest paid presenters in the annual report every year, starting from 2023. A register of interests for staff and contractors will also be established.
Licence fee and future funding
A longer term problem facing the new director general is how RTÉ is funded and who pays for it.
Currently RTÉ gets about €200 million a year in TV licence fee income, though the station has long complained that the rate of evasion costs it about €50 million a year.
There is a legal obligation to have a TV licence, which costs €160, for having a television in a home or business.
Roughly €140 million of RTÉ's €340 million annual budget comes from commercial activities, principally advertising.
RTÉ's finances have been under strain since the financial crash in 2008. The broadcaster posted large deficits during the recession when advertising and licence fee income plummeted and the government was making cuts to public services.
Commercial funding at RTÉ has not returned to Celtic Tiger-levels and the shift towards digital advertising means those revenues are unlikely to grow.
The organisation sold part of its Dublin campus for €107 million in 2017 in a bid to stabilise its finances, but successive RTÉ bosses and chairs have continued to call for reform of the funding model.
A report on the future of Irish media published last summer recommended that public service broadcasting is paid for directly out of taxation and that the licence fee is abolished.
At the time the Government welcomed the Future of Media Commission's findings, but proposed "an alternative approach to the commission’s recommendation on a new funding model".
However, senior Government sources told the Sunday Independent last week that a household media tax, which was last proposed a decade ago, could be now considered, as could funding RTÉ directly from the exchequer.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar admitted last week that the licence fee is currently being collected in an inefficient or "wasteful" way.
"I think reform of the TV licence is long overdue and I want that to happen during this Government," he said.
"I can see the political temptation to put it off for another government or another Dáil, but I do not want to do that, and I want to make sure we have a new system up and running during the lifetime of this Government."
He also said RTÉ may have to change the way it manages its accounts, potentially separating out its public and private sector funding streams.
In any case, Bakhurst is likely to oversee a major shift in how RTÉ generates and spends cash to fulfil its public service broadcasting mandate.
Corporate governance
RTÉ's internal financial, accounting and governance practices have been scrutinised like never before in recent weeks.
The management culture of RTÉ was under the spotlight when senior staff faced intensive questions at Oireachtas committees over the secret Tubridy payments.
In response the Government has set up two "root and branch" reviews of the broadcaster – the first will look at governance and the organisational culture in RTÉ, and the second will examine human resources and how external contractors are engaged.
One of Bakhurst's first moves as director general was to "stand down" the RTÉ executive board in response to what he described as the "shameful" revelations that have emerged in recent weeks.
The executive has been replaced with a new "interim leadership team", with all significant decisions now having to be agreed by the whole leadership team.
"There can be no repeat of the siloed and, at times, secretive decision-making that has been at the root of the shameful events of the past weeks. As custodians of public money, our financial integrity must be on a par with our editorial integrity," Bakhurst said.
Trust
Public trust in RTÉ is undoubtedly weaker after weeks of negative headlines – rebuilding that trust will be key if Bakhurst is to be successful in reforming the organisation.
Before the recent controversy came to light, trust in Irish news media was relatively high compared to other European countries. RTÉ is also recognised as the most trusted news brand in the country, according to the most recent Reuters Digital News report.
But maintaining that level of approval will be challenging, with Bakhurst himself saying trust in RTÉ had been "severely diminished".
"It’s been a highly damaging two weeks for RTÉ and it’s been painful to watch," he said last week.
On his first morning on the job, Bakhurst said change would "be essential if we are to rebuild trust in public service broadcasting in Ireland and in RTÉ."
