Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael)

Can the Taoiseach credibly say that policy decisions are being made in a better fashion since the Government destroyed the Freedom of Information Act in 2002 when it removed the opportunity for scrutiny of government decisions at the time, and shortly after, they were taken? Does the Taoiseach still believe that the smothering of public discussion on many important decisions has improved decision-making? Will he agree that we would be much better off if we had proper freedom of information disclosure in respect of decisions such as those on decentralisation?

Decentralisation was a disastrous decision which was ill-thought at the time. We would also be much better off if we had open discussions and information on the decisions concerning public sector benchmarking which were completely concealed. We would be much better off if we had open information about the failures of regulation in the banking system which we still do not know enough about.

See this speech in context