Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I put up my hands. The legislation from which the authority works is not fit for purpose. The powers of the authority need to be extended. I had sympathy for Ms Feehily when she talked about how she had tried to influence the Department of Justice and Equality and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to get around certain issues.

On the issue of ICT, which Deputy Wallace raised and which I have raised on numerous occasions, I, as a member of the Committee of Public Accounts, have greater capacity to deal with it than Ms Feehily. That is insane.

Ms Feehily is chairperson of the Policing Authority. We will deal with this soon, but I wish to run through a number of other issues first.

I am still not in any way clear about the use of Gmail. Deputy Wallace and others raised this. I raised it too and I specifically asked questions of all the senior managers, who all said they did not use it. Obviously, Ms Feehily cannot talk about what is going on in the Charleton tribunal, but it is obvious that information has been given out in the tribunal which shows that Gmail is being used. If the CAO said one thing in a committee, as seems to be the case, and said the complete opposite about providing a report to the authority, does that not raise huge concerns? I am still not clear what has happened here. I am still not clear whether a full report was done. I know about the report. Was it comprehensive? Has it dealt with all the issues? All the senior assistant commissioners and deputy commissioners, who answered the question one by one in another committee room, said they never used it for any official policing purposes, but I do not know what to believe any more.