Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I do not wish to confine anyone to the number of questions they ask but if I could just deal with them in some sort of order.
The Deputy's first question was why did I fail to outline the fact that GSOC had undertaken a public interest investigation. I expressly said in my script that GSOC had commenced an investigation. I then proceeded to detail the outcome of the investigation. I assumed - and I am repeating what I said in the Dáil last night - that Deputies were familiar with the relevant legislation and certainly that the Opposition spokespersons were. The only section of the Act under which GSOC could have itself commenced an investigation without having received a complaint, was section 102(4), which is the public interest investigation. There was no suggestion GSOC had received a complaint from anybody. There was no suggestion that the Garda Commissioner had asked it to investigate anything or that I had asked it to investigate anything. I made the simple statement that GSOC had commenced an investigation; that certainly did not result in my anticipating that for political reasons, people would come along and suggest that I misled the Dáil. It was the only method that GSOC could have deployed in commencing an investigation and there is no mystery about it.
What I was doing in the House last Tuesday week was summarising the information that I had received. I could have not only referred to section 102(4) of the Act but I could have referred to the relevance of section 98 of the Act and the relevance of section 103 of the Act but I did not do so. In dealing with the section 103 matter I made a reference to the fact that I had not been informed of these matters, that I learned of them in the The Sunday Times report and that I had never received a report on them from GSOC. If I had wanted to be legally technical I would have cited the specific provisions of section 103 of the Act. What I was trying to do was to detail for the House my knowledge of the matter and of the events but not to engage in some sort of legal treatise on the sections of the Act. I have no idea why this is an issue of any controversy because it was the only section that could have been deployed.
The Deputy asked me what was the reason I was given for GSOC commencing the section 102 investigation. The only reasons I was given were the two reasons I referenced in my response to Deputy Mulherin. I was given no other reasons and that is why there was a conversation involving myself and Simon O'Brien and with two officials present from my Department, in order to see if there was anything else to be said about it. We did have concerns about the proportionality of GSOC making that decision at that moment. It may have been appropriate, with further technical advice, to have made the decision at a later stage, but in circumstances where there was nothing at all to indicate Garda involvement, it was difficult to understand why that decision was made. The Deputy is right in that he has listed all sorts of bodies and he asked whether it could have been the Revenue Commissioners or Customs and Excise or the Defence Forces. I would equally ask whether it could have been some foreign agency or whether it could have been based on what we have learned was happening in England, whether it could have been a journalist or anybody else. I am not suggesting it was but I am just saying there was a lot of "could it have been". The only body which GSOC has a statutory remit to investigate is An Garda Síochána. The section of the Act has to have some purpose; it cannot simply be a case of, "We think it might be, therefore we are investigating". There has to be some substantive reason for doing it and it remains a mystery to me as to why at that moment in time, that decision was made.
The Deputy asked why did I make a comment about baseless innuendo. If the Deputy reads my speech, he will see what I said on last Tuesday week was that for the preceding 48 hours - I emphasise that time period - the Garda Síochána had been subject to baseless innuendo which arose out of the way the matter found its way into the public domain.
I refer Deputies - I apologise if I am being somewhat lengthy in my reply but it is relevant to the issue - to the interview that Mr. FitzGerald gave to "Prime Time" on Tuesday evening after I made my statement. He was asked a variety of questions by Miriam O'Callaghan and I will not go over them all. He was asked about the issue of the Garda Síochána. My reference to baseless innuendo was not that GSOC made baseless innuendo but that arising out of the report in The Sunday Times, there was a myriad of public discussions suggesting that the Garda Síochána - and that there was definitive evidence - had been engaged in surveillance with GSOC.
Miriam O'Callaghan asked Mr. FitzGerald, "In your statement last night [this is GSOC statement in its press release] you said there was no evidence of Garda misconduct. Why would you say that in the first place if you were not thinking that?" He replied, "Because the reason we said that last night and that I am happy to repeat it here now, is that it is part of the public discussion in Dáil Éireann this evening and all over the airwaves the last couple of days people are pointing the fingers. May I say it is unfair of people to point fingers at the Garda Síochána on the basis of anything we have said or done". Miriam O'Callaghan then said, "But your statement last night did that" Mr. FitzGerald said, "No, our statement last night was meant to try to clear that up and say we did not find evidence of Garda misconduct because the public discourse seems to be pointing in the direction of finding the [Garda] guilty of this thing when we are saying quite clearly and categorically and in no uncertain terms, we found no evidence to point to that direction and for people to suggest that, you know, they were up to something. We're the people that did the examination; we're the people with the evidence; we do not have any evidence to point in that direction". It is quite clear that Mr. FitzGerald was of the view that the Garda Síochána was being the subject of baseless innuendo, not by GSOC but in the commentary that continued through and even past the statement I made to the Dáil on Tuesday week last, and that similar commentary has continued right up to the decision made by the Cabinet which we announced.
I will deal with the final matter in the context of the questions I was asked.

Deputy Ó Snodaigh asked what the Garda Commissioner told me when I asked him what information he had which gave rise to suspicions that the offices were under surveillance. I assume the Deputy does not mean that the Commissioner thought the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission offices were under surveillance; I take it he means that GSOC itself thought that. I have not had a conversation with the Garda Commissioner in which-----