RTÉ board’s clash with Bass is not the drama the broadcaster needs

Bass is one of the most powerful figures in Ireland’s independent production sector, and is known for his direct and no-nonsense approach.

He has fallen out with RTÉ in the past — in 2008 the broadcaster dropped his show You’re a Star.

“The way the decommissioning of You’re a Star was handled left a lot to be desired,” he said some years later. Although he was angry at the time, his comments since have been reasonably diplomatic.

While Bass is often blunt, he is also well respected in the industry. A number of sources said last week that he would have brought considerable expertise to the RTÉ board.

He is a very successful TV man who has enjoyed commercial success with so-called shiny floor shows and, given RTÉ’s financial crisis, has a valuable perspective.

RTÉ insiders claim conflicts of interest was the central issue objection to his appointment.

But Bass is not the first independent producer to sit on the board — Stuart Switzer, a shareholder in another significant production company Coco Productions, did a five-year stint from 2010. So there is a precedent here, although I hear he wasn’t initially welcomed with open arms.

RTÉ seems to feel that the scale of the work Bass currently delivers for RTÉ made his appointment unsuitable. Perhaps there is a fair point here and arguably corporate governance has moved on since Switzer was appointed over a decade ago.

However, RTÉ made all these points to Media Minister Catherine Martin, as well as seeking advice from lawyers on the matter, and she was not for turning.

Seasoned executives know unhappiness with board appointees is nothing new in business. But once the appointment is made everyone generally gets on with it.

Conflicts of interest are also a regular feature of Irish boardrooms and there are usually procedures in place to deal with this. Doherty herself is co-founder of Tyrone Productions, an independent television production company. She resigned as a director of the company when she took over as chairwoman of RTÉ.

RTÉ will find itself able to get little, if any, relevant commercial expertise on its board if it sticks too rigidly to a conflict of interest protocol. At the very least it should publicly outline what conflicts of interest it deems to be acceptable and what is does not.

Larry Bass told the Sunday Times last week that he did not feel welcome at his first board meeting, while Moya Doherty claims that the meeting was cordial.

But did the board really need to have a matter relating to Shinawil, Bass’s company, on the agenda for his first meeting? How many times would the company appear on the agenda in a year? And could it have been postponed, to allow everyone to start on a positive footing?

The matter up for discussion is understood to have related to Dancing with the Stars – Bass’s big budget show which is believed to cost between €4m and €5m to produce.

Whatever happened at that meeting, Bass resigned from the board RTÉ never wanted him on in the first place.

But it hasn’t come out of this well.

The organisation has been pleading for additional funding, a restructuring of the licence fee and has outlined its ambitious vision of a new digital future. There is a good chance this would involve more oversight as any extra funding in the past has usually been linked to more transparency and accountability.

The Future of the Media Commission’s report is due to be published any day and it is the key to RTÉ’s future financing. The report will make lots of recommendations but RTÉ will need political support for any action to be taken. There are already rumblings that big funding decisions for RTÉ will be kicked down the road once again.

While RTÉ may have some valid concerns — Bass is clearly a major supplier to RTÉ — recent events have made the board look stubborn and insular and are unlikely to have done it any favours in political circles.

Changes ahead as firms look closer to home

A report by Woodland Group, a freight and logistics expert, has highlighted how difficulties in moving goods between Ireland and Asia has hit supply chains hard.

A shift to near sourcing — ie making sure goods are sourced more locally — is something happening in real time.

According to Woodland, Irish companies are turning to Egypt, Turkey and Eastern Europe for supplies. It estimates 15pc of clients in Ireland shipping in Asia have sought advice on alternatives to goods sourced in Asia.

If this is being replicated elsewhere in Europe, it could point to a significant change in global supply chain patterns.