Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----although when I spoke to the Minister and the Secretary General, I was coming from a position of having been briefed by the Attorney General on the wide range of issues here, the discovery process, the transcribed tapes and the existence of a much wider systematic business of having tape recordings made in numerous Garda stations all over the country.

So, the Minister did not see the letter. The Minister was not aware of the letter. The Minister, therefore, was not briefed on the contents of the letter. He was briefed on the issues that had arisen, including the nature of the Bailey case, which was quite explosive in terms of the content of those tape recordings.

This is an example, Deputy Martin, of information being brought to Government level where Government has responded speedily and decisively in the sense of putting together a commission of investigation to look into these matters to sort this out once and for all and to put in place a structure which will provide an independent Garda authority where political accountability will still remain with the Minister of the day to this House. That is a long way, I might add, from the Deputy's own style of refusing to speak to former Fianna Fáil Ministers for justice. It is a long way from the time when we had the geriatric costs implied in the nursing homes scandal where the Secretary General of the Deputy's own Department briefed him on two occasions and said so at a committee of the Dáil and the Deputy relied on the Travers report to have a difference between the Department knowing and the Minister being aware.

So, the substance here, Deputy Martin,-----

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