MINISTER FOR Communications Pat Rabbitte said RTÉ faces a major challenge in re-establishing trust with the Irish people following the publication of a damning report into the Prime Time Investigates programme that libelled Fr Kevin Reynolds.
RTÉ will be fined €200,000 following an investigation by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland which found the programme was unfair to Fr Reynolds and a serious breach of his privacy.
The Mission To Prey programme falsely claimed Fr Reynolds had sexually abused a young girl and fathered her child while a missionary in Kenya.
The report published last night was heavily critical of journalism standards involved in the broadcast.
It found there was a significant failure of editorial and managerial controls within RTÉ, that note-taking was either non-existent or grossly inadequate and that in some cases gossip was treated as fact.
The reporter involved in the broadcast, Aoife Kavanagh, last night announced her resignation as a reporter and presenter with RTÉ.
In a statement she apologised to Fr Reynolds but said she did not accept many of the findings of the investigating officer.
“While acknowledging that mistakes were made I believe that I acted objectively and in good faith throughout the making of the programme. In this regard I do not accept many of the findings of the investigating officer in relation to the manner in which I carried out my work,” she said.
All the other programme makers involved have either left the organisation or moved jobs.
Former director of news Ed Mulhall took early retirement and current affairs editor Ken O’Shea has moved to a new role within the broadcaster. Mark Lappin, producer of the programme, has left the station to work for CNN in London. Executive producer Brian Páircéir has been off air since the inquiry began. Mr O’Shea and Mr Páircéir are subject to a further investigation by an external board that will conclude shortly.
Mr Rabbitte last night said the report posed serious questions for the RTÉ board and planned to meet its members early next week.
In addition, he said the findings posed a “fundamental challenge” for the broadcaster if it was to re-establish the high level of trust that it has enjoyed among Irish people.
“Regaining that trust is critical for RTÉ given that it is the public service broadcaster and significantly funded by the TV licence,” he said.
Among the report’s other findings were that:
The secret filming of the cleric and a doorstep interview was an unreasonable breach of his privacy;
There was a significant failure of editorial and managerial controls within the organisation;
It also failed to recognise the grave injustice which could be done to Fr Reynolds;
There was a lack of scrutiny and challenge within the department and overreliance on the team’s past experience, which led them into a “groupthink” mentality;
RTÉ did not waive its claim to privilege in the solicitor/client relationship between itself and its in-house legal staff.
RTÉ said it accepted the authority’s findings and expressed deep regret for the errors committed.
The broadcaster – which described the defamation as one of the gravest in its history – also published an independent report from Prof John Horgan into the safety of editorial processes and said it was training RTÉ staff in new guidelines.
The broadcaster’s director general, Noel Curran, said the findings did not make for easy reading. “We are not proud of . . . the findings. However, we have learned from and we will continue to learn from these grave errors,” he said.
