Early on in the Fr Reynolds libel story RTE Board chairman Tom Savage (top) insisted the ultimate responsibility lay with Ed Mulhall, director of news and current Affairs.
Mulhall was the “ultimate court of judgment and appeal” on Prime Time content, said Mr Savage before the results of three separate investigations became known.
Significantly he took great efforts to exonerate RTE Director General Noel Curran (above).
Stephen Price, writing in yesterday’s Sunday Times (behind paywall), points out a few nagging questions:
“Now [Aoife] Kavanagh , [Brian] Páircéir and [Ken] O’Shea seem to be claiming the BAI reached conclusions on matters they weren’t questioned about. One might be tempted to dismiss such complaints as sour grapes by journalists who screwed up, if other gaping holes did not remain in the sequence.
For example we have have been told little about how the chain of command at RTE functioned (or malfunctioned) in this instance .
How did Kavanagh justify her story to her producer and executive producer, in spite of the denials from Reynolds.? How did [Mark] Lappin [the show’s producer] and Páircéir then justify the programme to their boss O’Shea?
How did O’Shea convince his boss [Ed] Mulhall?
Did the buck really stop with Mulhall – or did he never discuss the programme with his boss, [Noel] Curran?
Hmm.
(Laura Hutton/Photocall Ireland)
