AFTER FOUR HOURS of questioning by the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee this morning, Ryan Tubridy and his agent Noel Kelly will went before the Oireachtas Media Committee to face further scrutiny about secret payments made to the presenter.
Tubridy became emotional at times, saying the reaction to the revelations made it “hard to leave the house”.
Throughout the day, Tubridy insisted that his decision to step down as host of The Late Late Show was not related to the scandal, saying he made the decision a year ago as he was feeling burnt out.
He said he is eager to return to presenting his weekday morning radio show, but conceded on several occasions that his time with RTÉ may be over.
Committee members occasionally expressed frustration over the lack of information that came from the lengthy sessions, but one claim that did emerge was Kelly’s allegation that it was RTÉ, not his company NK Management that decided to use the term “consultancy fees” on an invoice for Tubridy’s clandestine payments through a tripartite deal with Renault.
Kelly also claimed that Breda O’Keeffe, the former Chief Financial Officer of RTÉ, was involved in the deal between Renault and Tubridy being underwritten by the broadcaster.
One question still not fully answered is why Tubridy was paid more than what RTÉ said he was paid from 2017 to 2019.
The Oireachtas Media Committee meeting is now underway, with guests Ryan Tubridy and and his agent Noel Kelly in place.
TD’s will be questioning Tubridy and Kelly as part of their ongoing examination into the transparency of RTÉ’s spending of public funds, specifically in relation to the deal between Tubridy and Renault that was underwritten by the broadcaster.
The meeting will last for three hours. TD Chris O’ Sullivan has kicked things off by telling Tubridy and Kelly: “I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes”.
TD Chris O’ Sullivan has told Tubridy and Kelly that the the public will doubt how they didn’t question instructions from RTÉ to invoice a company called ‘ASTUS’ for €75,000 in ‘consultancy fees’, and that people will doubt there wasn’t an element of “deception involved”.
“Are you aware of any practice in accounting that allows an invoice to be raised, with a description that is not saying what it is actually for?” O’ Sullivan asked Kelly, who said he did what RTÉ told him to do.
TD Alan Dillon has questioned Kelly on why he didn’t ask Geraldine O’ Leary, the former Commercial Director of RTÉ, why he was being told not to put anyone’s name on the invoices he sent to ASTUS.
The invoice was made to collect the fee of €75,000 that Renault originally agreed to pay Ryan Tubridy, which was underwritten by RTÉ.
Kelly rejected Dillon’s claim that he collaborated with RTÉ to “hide” the payments that were made through the bartering system.
“I am not RTÉ,” Kelly said.
Ryan Tubridy tells the Oireachtas he “could be out of a job by Friday”. pic.twitter.com/USz45d6t9V
— TheJournal.ie (@thejournal_ie) July 11, 2023
Tubridy has said that he could be out of a job by Friday.
He said that while he is still being paid by RTÉ for his job as a radio presenter, he is not sure if that will still be the case in the coming weeks.
Noel Kelly has told TD Imelda Munster that he never wanted RTÉ to underwrite the commercial agreement between Tubridy and Renault.
He insisted that he wanted the deal to be underwritten in case there was a “change of sponsor”.
Munster told Kelly that she doesn’t “find it credible” that it was RTÉ who initiated the ‘tripartite agreement’ between Tubridy, Renault, and the broadcaster.
Kelly has told Munster that it is RTÉ who are responsible for disclosing Tubridy’s pay to the public.
Munster argued that Kelly could have saved Tubridy a lot of woe had he called the discrepancy out.
“We informed RTÉ and we also put it in as part of a contract, RTÉ are the ones that put figures out not us,” Kelly said.
TD Peter Fitzpatrick has asked Tubridy if he would be willing to return “overpayment” to the public funds.
Tubridy said: “There have been no overpayments”.
Fitzpatrick asked Tubridy if he really expected the public to not “put one and one together” when it comes to his awareness of the payments.
‘I’m not a very smart man when it comes to these things, that’s why I pay a very smart man to do them for me,” Tubridy said, adding that he never meant to insult “the intelligence of the Irish people” or to cause confusion.
A moment of tension and confusion as TD Peter Fitzpatrick accuses Ryan Tubridy and Dee Forbes of “jumping ship at the same time” from RTÉ.
“Ryan’s still under contract,” says Noel Kelly. pic.twitter.com/XM5c1Paxg6— TheJournal.ie (@thejournal_ie) July 11, 2023
Tubridy has insisted that he is still in contract with RTÉ, and that his current contract runs until 2025.
TD Fitzpatrick, interrupting him, said: ‘You’re not in contract, you are negotiating the contract’.
Tubridy clarified that he is re-negotiating his radio presenter contract.
“The contract still stands,” Tubridy’s agent Kelly said.
Ryan Tubridy has said that he is still willing to do commercial events if he is “called upon”, otherwise he will hand the fee attached to the appearances back.
TD Brendan Griffin asked Kelly how it could be the case that he and Tubridy didn’t know that RTÉ were paying the €75,000 commercial fee in the second and third year of the contract, when Geraldine O’ Leary said told the committee that Kelly chased her up on the payments.
Kelly said that RTÉ were always his point of contact for the agreement, despite his belief that it was Renault paying through the Astus account.
TD Fintan Warfield said that to most people’s understanding ‘taking a pay cut’ means working the same hours for less pay, which he says is not what Tubridy has done, despite repeatedly saying that his pay was cut.
In reply Kelly said over six years Tubridy had a 40 percent pay cut over six years, and talked about how the Late Late show can overrun.
“Ryan said himself, after Covid he left himself on the floor,”
Tubridy chimed in and told the committee: “In the event that i do keep my job and its touch and go at the moment, I’d be happy to suggest that in the future, we have a situation where you publish my contract annually.”
After saying that he is willing to do remaining commercial events if RTÉ calls on him to, Tubridy clarified that he is willing to pay back fees for these appearances if they don’t take place.
When asked who he would be paying the money back, Tubridy reflected: “It’s a good question”.
He initially said that he would pay back “Renault”, and then said “Astus” before concluding that it was RTÉ who paid the money, so he would be paying it back to RTÉ.
Our reporter Mia Douglas went to Doheny and Nesbitt’s pub on Dublin’s Baggot Street, one of the pubs where the Oireachtas proceedings were being shown.
As Ryan Tubridy and his agent Noel Kelly appeared before two Oireachtas committees, a number of pubs livestreamed the PAC session.
At Doheny and Nesbitts at lunchtime, pub-goers watched with intensity and often in complete silence.
The exception was some of Tubridy’s responses to questions, which were met with laughter from the crowd.People were there for similar reasons.
One woman told The Journal she had come to watch it on her break because she thought it was about time for Ryan to start talking.
Another person said they have been waiting for him to speak publicly, and that there were questions they had wanted to see answered.
The peaceful atmosphere broke into chatter during a committee break with people shared their thoughts on Tubridy’s future and whether the committee has changed their mind.
In between questions and statements, pub-goers checked their phones and typed away. Many appeared to be using social media to keep up with live updates online – and once their lunch break was over, they quickly dispersed, using their phones instead of the pub screen to watch the livestream.
Tubridy’s agent Noel Kelly has refused to tell the Oireachtas Media Committee how much he made in commission each year, if he made any at all, from the commercial agree agreement between Tubridy and Renault, that was underwritten and later paid by RTÉ.
Kelly said that it “wasn’t relevant” how he stood to financially benefit from the deal.
He also maintains that alongside Tubridy, he did not know that RTÉ paid the €75,000 fee until media reports came out in recent weeks.
TD Micheál Carrigy said it was “disappointing” that Kelly did not want to disclose the information, as it relates to “public money”.
“You will hear ten thousand stories about how the Late Late decision came to pass. There’s only one I believe, and that’s mine.”
Ryan Tubridy tells an Oireachtas committee that he “ran out of gas” presenting The Late Late Show https://t.co/r9YzLHm6hH pic.twitter.com/CSIytDn3he— TheJournal.ie (@thejournal_ie) July 11, 2023
Tubridy told the Media Committee that he decided to leave the Late Late Show because he “ran out of gas”.
“You will hear 10,000 stories about how the Late Late Show decision came to pass. There’s only one, I believe, and that’s mine. I presented that show. I loved working with the people, I loved the audience, I love the job, I did it for fourteen years, I ran out of gas, I chose to leave, there is no conspiracy,” he said.
Tubridy added that even if he is given the “royal order of the boot from RTÉ on Friday” he will always feel that his participation in the show and the money that was raised for charity was “beautiful”.
Kelly and Tubridy have rejected TD Mattie McGrath’s suggestion that Kelly drew up “false invoices” and was involved in “aiding and abetting”.
Kelly said: “We didn’t raise any false invoices. We did exactly what was asked of us by RTE.”
McGrath was in turns critical of the involvement of Kelly and Tubridy in the deal, but he also told Tubridy that he was glad he had received kind cards from members of the public, and that he wished his family well, and, that if Tubridy finds himself out of work, he is welcome to make a film in his constituency.
“Life is hard for everyone in Ireland, I’m not more special than anyone else, but when you are publicly cancelled the way I have been it is not easy,” Tubridy said in response to the sympathetic words.
Kelly has rejected the suggestion by Senator Shane Cassells that the yearly commercial fee that was initially paid by Renault to Tubridy, and was underwritten by RTÉ, was a “key factor” in the broadcaster retaining Ryan Tubridy’s services.
In a heated exchange, Kelly denied that the payments were proposed as a means of keeping Tubridy on board.
He instead suggested that RTÉ introduced the agreement as part of their efforts to retain Renault as a sponsor.
He also denied that Tubridy had other offers on the table when he began negotiating the contract.
“Ryan loves RTÉ,” he said.
WATCH LIVE: Ryan Tubridy and his agent Noel Kelly appear before a second Oireachtas committee to face more questions.
Follow our liveblog here https://t.co/r9YzLHmE7f https://t.co/wveW2LBAUS— TheJournal.ie (@thejournal_ie) July 11, 2023
Kelly has repeatedly said that invoices he drew up for “consultancy services” under RTÉ’s instructions were not “false”.
TD Ciaran Cannon asked if Kelly had not considered whether these invoices would lead to “reputational damage” to both him and Ryan Tubridy.
Kelly once again repeated that he did what RTÉ told him to do.
“I lost my dad a long long time ago but there is one line I will never forget, he always asked me, if Johnny told you to put your hand in the fire would you do it?” Cannon said to Kelly.
The two began to speak over one another until committee chair Niamh Smyth appealed for “one voice” in the room.
Kelly afterwards said “I’m tired” after getting confused in relation to the invoices.
Cannon said that six hours into committee meetings today, the Oireachtas is no further along in understanding how the deal between Tubridy, RTÉ and Renault took place.
SENATOR MARIE SHERLOCK told Ryan Tubridy that his depiction of his deal with Renault as a separate deal that he had as an independent contractor “doesn’t stack up”.
“The fact that the Late Late Show set was to be used for these [Renault] gigs shows that it wasn’t separate, you were using the RTÉ brand,” she said.
“We’ll have to disagree on that,” Tubridy muttered in response.
Ryan Tubridy has told the Media Committee: ‘Yes my salary is enormous, but that doesn’t effect my soul”.
He was responding to Senator Marie Sherlock asking if his integrity has been damaged.
“I don’t think I’m a different person to the one in the last 14 years promoted St Vincent De Paul, or told children not to bully each other, or promoted child literacy, all really important things,” Tubridy said.
Tubridy has insisted that during the pandemic, when the teams on his shows were being asked to take pay cuts, he “operated under the belief” that he too was taking a pay cut.
He also said that he did take a pay cut, and that while he understands it is “different” for him, he thinks that “everyone brings something different to the table”.
Noel Kelly and Ryan Tubridy are soon to be relieved from their six hour stint in front of Oireachtas Committees today.
Senator Timmy Dooley is now asking the questions – it remains to be seen if he can uncover a revelation on par with his last performance, when he brought the Marty Morrissey car controversy alight, but then said the presenter was being thrown under the bus.
We’re onto closing remarks from Tubridy and Kelly now.
Kelly says the last two and a half weeks have been “absolutely horrendous” for his name, his business and his family.
“We have gone through everything, everything, everything.”
Appearing to become emotional, he said the information came out in a flurry and there was no “duty of care” to Tubridy.
“Who reached out to see how he was?”
He thanked the committee for having him and Tubridy.
Tubridy concludes that if he returns to RTÉ it will be a “new world order”.
“If I was to sign another contract I’d put it out in the public straight away.”
He says he hates being called “the talent”, and he says the talent in RTÉ is everyone from those working in the reception to those doing hair and makeup. “Please take that silly word off the contract,” he says.
He thanks the committee for their courtesy and time.
He also thanks his family and “the people of Ireland” for their kindness in recent weeks.
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