John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We should make a decision on the matter rather than referring it to the CPP. It was a private meeting and the committee agreed that it would be private. The clerk referred to legal advice received, which stated that publication of the transcript would constitute a fundamental change in the way the Oireachtas and its committees do their business. The reality is that there was not a great deal of substance to what was said at that meeting. In the past five minutes, the Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr. McCarthy, debunked quite an amount of what was said in the context of the number of penalty points that were written off. The theory posited by Sergeant McCabe was that tens of thousands of penalty points were written off. The Comptroller and Auditor General made a definitive case to the effect that only hundreds of penalty points were written off.

Outside of that, the committee did not learn a great deal as a result of what was said at the meeting in question. It might be stated that the latter is a good reason to allow publication but I do not believe that to be the case. I return to the fact that publishing the transcript would give rise to a fundamental change in the way Oireachtas committees operate. If someone were to appear before one of the committees in the future to discuss security or privacy issues, there could be a danger that a transcript of the proceedings could be made public in certain circumstances. That is a step too far for the Oireachtas and its committees. I stated at last week's meeting that the committee had, to an extent, entered the twilight zone. We have crossed over into the realm of the politically paranormal where a private meeting becomes a public meeting. Perhaps we should hold a public meeting and ensure that everyone swears on the Bible that he or she will not repeat what was said. It is just absurd. We must be clear and definitive with regard to how we treat private meetings. We must clarify the position completely. Beyond that, we are entering the arena of the nonsensical.