Ivan Yates told the Oireachtas media committee on Wednesday that he ‘deliberately’ did not tell Matt Cooper about the coaching.

Mr Yates, a former Fine Gael minister and ex-broadcaster, provided about four hours of media training to Fianna Fáil presidential candidate Jim Gavin.

Ivan Yates has said he did ‘nothing wrong’ by not declaring to his audience that he had provided media coaching to Jim Gavin.