Imelda Munster (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Okay. That is fair enough.

I want to ask Mr. Kelly a question. I find it very hard to believe or I just do not find it credible that he said earlier this morning that RTÉ initiated this whole deal – that RTÉ was the instigator of this tripartite deal. I cannot figure out why, if his client was the only one to benefit from such a deal, RTÉ would be the one to initiate a deal and to develop it, even though it would cost it money by underwriting it? It is clear that Mr. Kelly wanted a commercial deal - otherwise, he would not have entered into it in the first instance - and a guaranteed and underwritten payment by RTÉ. At the same time, we were watching Covid spread from the east. In February, while the emails were going back and forth on this deal, Italy had already gone into lockdown. Was it not the case that Mr. Kelly saw a way for income to be guaranteed by RTÉ and that he locked RTÉ into that agreement that it would have to forfeit? As it transpires, that is exactly what happened.