Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

The reason I asked this question is that the Taoiseach came to office promising a more open freedom of information system but, from my experience, he has done the opposite. Last March the Taoiseach said after a meeting in Brussels that he had fought hard to counter a proposal to destroy our corporation tax and he talked about how tough he had been defending the nation. At the time, we asked to see the proposal he was speaking of and he refused to publish it. He may recall that President Van Rompuy produced a compromise.

The Taoiseach admitted in the House that there was documentation about this but he said his account of it was all we could get. We then made the freedom of information request. The Taoiseach invoked a series of extreme defences to withhold it, and he has done the same on appeal. One of the major issues arising is the absurd situation that the Taoiseach has now claimed that European rules prevent him from releasing the documentation and that its release would damage the Government's international relations. We checked this with the European Council-----

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