Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 19 February 2014

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Public Service Oversight and Petitions

Security and Surveillance Issues: Minister for Justice and Equality

4:55 pm

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

The conclusion of GSOC is that there is no evidence of Garda misconduct. The Deputy has accepted other GSOC reports where Garda failures have been identified. He has a difficulty accepting a GSOC report where GSOC itself says there is no evidence of Garda misconduct. All the jumping up and down in the world does not establish Garda misconduct.

On the issue the Deputy has raised, in the context of one of the threats, he is missing the point that the first two were the ones that had nothing to do with alleged kit that only governments can acquire. There was a reference quite clearly in the security firm's report to a device that allegedly it is said only governments can acquire. The Deputy might recall that Simon O'Brien said something to the committee that was similar to what he said to me - that he was not convinced in fact that this was kit that only governments could acquire. It might be kit that, in law, only governments can acquire - I am not sure that is necessarily right either - but he did not accept that as a serious statement from his own security firm, which is why I did not particularly highlight it because what was really important was the conclusion - had there or had there not been surveillance and the answer was that there was no definitive indicator of surveillance. I am afraid it gets a bit more complicated-----

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