Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

——I feel I am in such a circumstance.

The issues that arose in Donegal and gave rise to the Morris tribunal continue to arise around the country. Just last week, for example, we read of allegations that gardaí worked with a convicted drug dealer in allowing the distribution of drugs which were later seized by the same officers. Criminal charges relating to a €1.7 million drugs find were later dropped without any explanation. Some of the much touted reforms put in place after earlier reports from the Morris tribunal, around the handling of informers, will now be under close scrutiny again as a result of an inquiry under way by the Garda Ombudsman Commission.

The inquiry will be examining very similar issues to those that arose in Donegal — an informer who told arresting gardaí he was working for members of the force; the nature of the informer's relationship, if any, with the gardaí; whether he was distributing drugs with the knowledge of gardaí while they used him as an informer; whether he led gardaí to find drugs hauls after he had passed those drugs to other dealers; whether his contact with gardaí was linked to the drugs charges against him being dropped; and whether he was a registered Garda informer.

Both the registering of informers and the logging of contact with them was intended to be a key reform introduced following the Morris tribunal because part of the corruption exposed in the Donegal division involved two gardaí pretending they had an IRA informer who gave them information about bombs the gardaí themselves had planted. Does the Minister seriously think this should not be investigated? If there is anything at all to the subject matter of this latest inquiry — I do not know if there is — then what the Garda Commissioner has referred to as a "dark period in the history of a proud organisation" is far from over.

The latest report from the tribunal has concluded that the McBrearty family and their associates were subject to Garda harassment after the death of Richie Barron in Raphoe in October 1996. While this campaign was run at the level of the local corrupt sergeant, it was permitted to remain in place at the most senior level in the Donegal division. In normal circumstances, these findings of harassment at the hands of the Garda Síochána would be shocking enough but because of the six reports that have come before, we are no longer so easily shocked. If anything, we probably see these findings as tame.

To put the last two reports in context, we have been told that gardaí conducted a prejudiced and negligent investigation into the death of Mr. Barron. He actually died as a result of a hit and run road traffic incident but a confession to his murder was nonetheless obtained. It was not obtained voluntarily. Gardaí engaged in harassment and orchestrated hoax explosive finds and planted evidence. When called to account, they either lied or they covered up for corrupt colleagues.

There were findings of unlawful arrest and detention, physical and verbal abuse of persons in custody and the illegal recording of conversations between solicitors and their clients. There was perjury, insubordination, breakdown of discipline, misuse of informants, attempts to pervert the course of justice and the closure of ranks to protect the guilty.

With all this, the Department has written a script for the Minister devoted to two responsible Members of this House bringing information that caused this tribunal to happen in the first place into the hands of the then Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform while refusing to make public comment inside or outside this House. The Minister has come in here with the audacity to make the kind of contribution he gave.

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