Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

We see a pattern of the Government being keen to keep a firm hand on organisations. For example, in the case of the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission, GSOC, which we would argue was designed to fail, it made sure it failed by giving it as little money as possible. How effective will the commission be if the Government pulls its strings too closely?

On a separate issue, I heard the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, defending some of the big brother type policies around the collection of data as an issue of State security and using the threat of terrorism as a good reason for these policies. There will always be a conflict between the individual and how much data the State wishes to store on the individual, and the State will use State security as a reason. I raised the issue of telephone tapping when Vodafone tapped into the fibre optic cable off the coast of Wales a couple of years ago, which gave it access to almost every telephone in Ireland at the time.

It was impossible to get answers from the Government about it. We do not know why. It was also impossible to get information back from it as to what it knew about the situation. Was it legal? Would the decision come from Government Communications Headquarters, GCHQ? The Government seems to hide behind this State security thing in order to do what it likes in this area. Only a couple of weeks ago, or last week, we heard the British Prime Minister, Theresa May, make the argument that human rights could almost be undermined in the interest of security, to fight terrorism.

Is there going to be a battle of that nature here, around how our data is being stored and how much information authorities are going to be allowed to put together on us? I asked Mr. Seamus Carroll last time and he did not really want to give me an answer on it. Are we entitled to know what authorities put down about us on this identity card or our passports?