Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator. She has flagged up the concerns about the operation of the confidential committee and my own reflection, having looked at the report, is that there are questions about the appropriateness of trying to accommodate an investigative, judicial process and a truth-telling process in one inquiry. The difficulties of that have become apparent.

The Senator asked about details of the transfer of the archive of the commission. We will be receiving all information, including information on all of its administrative processes. All of that will be transferring to me, as part of the commission's archive. I hope that the extent of that information will be such that it will be able to provide me and my officials with a full account of the actions that were taken by the commission.

The commission of investigation and the Data Protection Commissioner have been engaged in correspondence as regards the procedures undertaken by the commission. I know that within that correspondence, and in the commission's correspondence with the committee, it has sought to draw attention to the fact that it believes its processes have been legitimate. I have written to the commission to urge it to engage as fully as possible with the Data Protection Commissioner because I am conscious that it is important that clarity is provided on the various processes that were undertaken by the confidential committee. As I said when I met the Senator on this issue, I have also engaged directly and met with the Data Protection Commissioner to reassure her that we were urging the commission to engage fully with her office and also in the context of ensuring that the actions we take when the archive transfers to the Department at the end of the month are conducted fully in compliance with the general data protection regulation, GDPR.