Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The circumstances are not comparable in any shape or form, yet the Minister wants to go down the road of distraction. After a week's silence, the Minister gave a few exclusive comments to one journalist last night in which he signalled he would go on the attack today and had been trawling in his Department all week for evidence to support his case. Only the most gullible will accept, having listened to the Minister this morning, that he tried to give a balanced and fair view of the record. He has a proven track record of selective quotations and has been driven constantly by an obsessive need to justify himself. There is no reason to believe he has given the House a full and balanced picture of what is in the Department's files.

While the Minister believes he has been smeared because others had the nerve to question him, he should remember that the Taoiseach explicitly stated that I have handled this matter responsibly. He must also face the inconvenient fact that while he announced today that he has reviewed the matter and found he was right in everything he has done, the Cabinet stated yesterday that the matter needed to be reviewed externally. That is a significant point, as it is the view of the Cabinet, in particular, the Taoiseach, having read the dossier. Does the Minister expect us to believe that when the Taoiseach and Tánaiste refer to the issues involved as "grave" and state they cannot make up their minds who to believe and the matter needs external review and possibly an investigation, they do so because they believe everything is fine?

There is substantive evidence that there is an ongoing and profound problem in how allegations of improper behaviour in the Garda are handled. A culture of deep suspicion has developed, meaning that the relationships between the Minister, Garda Commissioner, Office of the Confidential Recipient and Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission are at best dysfunctional and at worst actively subverting the goal of dealing with allegations of improper behaviour. The Minister and Garda Commissioner have admitted that these relations are poor. An atmosphere that leads the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission to hire a British company to screen its offices for bugs is one in which the public interest is not being served.

The paperwork around this review is being reviewed by a former High Court judge, despite the fact that the Minister did his level best to dismiss these concerns out of hand. It remains a disgrace that he refused to consult the Oireachtas on the terms of the review and that Mr. Justice Cooke is not being allowed to check evidence.It is now a consistent tactic of the Government that when a Minister is caught in a crisis, as occurs with increasing frequency, the first priority is to manage the media rather than the issue.We have seen this approach in operation in recent weeks.

Before today, the Minister was unavailable to the public whereas active behind-the-scenes briefing was taking place non-stop.While this debate is welcome, Members have not been supplied with any of the documents the Minister used to try to undermine the allegations and attack others. If the Minister had intended this debate to be a genuine effort to allow questioning, he would have circulated the relevant reports, especially the report of the Garda Inspectorate, and supplied a briefing to the Opposition. He could also have provided access to the files he has used to formulate today’s attack but of course chose not to do so. Why would he allow anyone the chance to answer back?

From early yesterday evening, the Government was briefing the media that the Minister would come into the House with all guns blazing and had the evidence to back up his case. If he was so secure in this, why has he failed to let anyone else see the evidence? Why has he again insisted on trying to deny a fair debate?

For three years, the Minister has adopted the strategy that attack is the only form of defence.

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