Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

I appreciate that. If we provide for a mechanism whereby it can be stated that a tape will not be supplied in particular cases, in the interests of the accused person, we will raise the immediate implication that he or she is hiding something from the people who are putting pressure on him to get the tape so they can look at it. It is a difficult question. I do not have a 100% solution to it. If somebody declines to make a statement on tape, it would be desirable, subject to practicality, for there to be a formal and verifiable record that that was what happened. I do not know whether that is practicable, however. Perhaps it would not cause as much difficulty to hold back on that particular tape as it would in the other circumstance.

Deputies should be aware that there are godfathers of crime who will ask a person who has been accused of a serious crime to produce the tape. Such tapes can be ostensibly demanded for legal purposes, but in fact they are used to check that people stayed schtum at the relevant moment and were not too co-operative with the gardaí. That is an infrequent but genuine occurrence, unfortunately. It is not clear to me how we should deal with that. Perhaps Deputies have bright ideas in that regard. It is not clear to me exactly how we can get around this issue.

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