John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will add my voice on this matter before we move on. There is a significant issue here. I do not know how the Minister will get around it legally but effort has to be made by all concerned to recognise the problem we now have. There are cases currently going through a settlement process in which a certain amount of bullying and intimidation is being applied to get an outcome. The protected disclosure element is not being recognised by Departments. These are Departments that are supposed to be leading in terms of legislation and the application of law. That is quite frightening because it is the State allowing this to happen and paying the legal fees to allow it to happen. That is wrong. It is an abuse of power and taxpayers' money.

There are cases that have been before various Departments for years. I refer to the episode of "RTÉ Investigates" to be broadcast tonight. Some cases have been with that Department for a considerable time but have not been resolved. They are all being dealt with internally. That is wrong. I will be looking to the next step the Minister will take to determine how all those cases will be dealt with. They have been stalled not by the whistleblowers but by the State itself using taxpayers' money to achieve the outcome it wants and to block in a very considerable way the whistleblowers and the advancing of the cases being made by those whistleblowers. That is frightening.

The Minister heads up the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. The committee previously asked how many cases have been settled and for how much by the various Departments that ended up on the steps of the courthouse. We asked how many of those cases had a confidentiality clause forced on the whistleblower in the context of a settlement. That is a significant piece of information that I would like to see as we go to the next Stage of analysing this legislation. I would also like to know how many Ministers, not just in the current Government but also in previous Governments, received protected disclosures but sat on them. How many Departments have not processed within the legal framework a protected disclosure? The Committee of Public Accounts recently received correspondence regarding a whistleblower and named the whistleblower. That is against the law and the legislation.

As a State, we seem to be presiding over an abuse of the current legislation and of taxpayers' money. Departments seem to be sitting on cases and refusing to move on them for reasons not known to anyone. The best trick in the book is to say to anyone inquiring about a whistleblower and the outcome of the case that it is being referred to the Garda. There are cases in respect of which that statement was made in defence of the status of the case but the response of the Garda was that no case had been referred to it. I do not think that is good enough. The Minister and the Government have to take note of what is happening here. We have to get to the bottom of the issues that all present have raised in the Chamber, at committee meetings and so on. While this legislation may provide for the future, the manner in which the Minister addresses the retrospective nature of this is what we will be judged on because those people who made protected disclosures have been beaten up by the State and their lives have been ruined. They have been named here. They have come before the committee. There have been cases where the Workplace Relations Commission, WRC, has made a recommendation but the Department continues to try to defend itself with taxpayers' money. How sick is that? How wrong is it? When it comes to this particular debate, I certainly will contribute more fully. We have named names here. I will not do so again today. I ask the Minister to check with the various Departments on the questions I have raised and provide some sort of answers as we debate this on next Stage of the Bill.

As regards the cases that remain to be dealt with, I am not saying all of them will be successful but I am saying to give them a chance. These people are not making things up. It may not be a sound piece of evidence that is being received but most of the whistleblowers I have encountered have come forward in good faith to try to improve the lot of the agency, Department or whatever it might be and they have been treated disgracefully by the State. I really hope we have a fuller debate on this matter, with answers to those questions as we reach that point. Do I take it the amendment is not being pursued now?