Shane Ross (Dublin South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The fact of the matter is that I did not suggest that he be made chairman of the Bank of Ireland either. I put down a question about whether he was in the running, along with many other people. If the Minister wants to misinterpret that, as he does, it is no wonder he gets into so much trouble politically in this House and that he is now a Minister demoted rather than one promoted. If he does not check his facts and comes into the House and says things like that, it is no wonder, as he cannot be relied on by the Government.

Having cleared that up, I would like to make one or two points. I welcome the fact that there is a unanimous pursuit of the truth in this House and I do not doubt for one moment that this is the objective of the Minister for Finance and other Ministers in this House. I do not doubt that this is also the objective of Deputy Catherine Murphy or the leaders of the Opposition, but I find that the solution that has been agreed upon, of setting up another commission of inquiry or tribunal, or whatever one would like to call it, is unsatisfactory. This is a tried and tested way to divert problems out into the distance. The history of tribunals of inquiry and commissions of inquiry is a sad one in this House. I will reflect on one or two of the things that have happened previously. The Ministers will be aware of the fact that an Ansbacher inquiry was set up many years ago in order to unearth, remedy and penalise those who had committed offences which were revealed by political stories. I cannot remember the exact number but I believe more than 100 people were outed by the Ansbacher inquiry. They settled with the Revenue Commissioners. How many of those people have been prosecuted to this day? The answer is none - not a single one. The response of the Revenue Commissioners to that when asked about it was that it is very difficult to collect evidence against people of that sort. Many of those people settled, yet they cannot be prosecuted. It is an extraordinary solution to a problem that has never been resolved and that remains unresolved.

Another inquiry into DIRT tax in the banks was set up by this House some years ago. The result of that was that many small people who had indeed indulged in tax evasion were outed and had to make large settlements. How many bankers have been faulted for what happened in those cases? How many of the powerful have been faulted? The answer is none - not a single one. There are either still in their jobs or retired, but the result of that inquiry was the outing a large number of people who were encouraged by the powerful to break the law, and they were prosecuted or penalised while the bankers were not.

Let us consider other inquiries. We had the Smithwick tribunal, which went on forever, we had the Moriarty tribunal, which was debated in this House, we had the Mahon tribunal and we had the beef tribunal. The result of the latter was fairly ineffective, but what it did result in was a statement in this House by a former Attorney General that it was the longest job application in history. That is why I worry particularly about this inquiry: because the judge in that case who was sitting on the tribunal ended up as Chief Justice. Therefore, I ask the Minister this: is there some absolutely sacred rule that a person who has been in the Judiciary should automatically be appointed as chairman of such an inquiry, and therefore we should accept him or her as someone of totally unimpeachable motivation or expertise? There should be no automatic acceptance of that fact. It is true that under the 2004 Act a person who sits as a single judge in charge of a tribunal and should be a judge or retired judge. One of the problems here is that we have insiders judging insiders. I am not suggesting that whoever is appointed eventually is flawed. It would be helpful if we knew in advance who it was, but everybody in this House knows that those who are going to sit in judgment in such tribunals are political appointees. They are appointed by Governments and by individuals on a very partisan basis which is utterly flawed and discredited. I know the Government intends, or so it says, to introduce a new judicial Bill with a new way of appointing the Judiciary, but that has been delayed and delayed. My guess is that it will not sort out the problem of appointing judges and it will not sort out the problem that political appointees will be in charge of this inquiry. That in itself raises the question as to who should be in charge and how they should operate. It is very serious because it indicates the kind of web that exists whereby people can choose political appointees to come up with a solution which, by its very nature, is questionable and should be challenged.

I also believe that while there is a genuine desire to find out the truth, this is a political vehicle. What has the row been about over the past few days? It has been about terms of reference and timing. One can put forward all sorts of reasons as to why the timing should be different. One can say we should have the report by Christmas and an interim report by October. The reason there are timing differences and timing disagreements is nothing to do with the merits of a report, the timing of a report or the facts that will come out. They are to do with one thing: the date of the election. That is all they are to do with. The Government wants it to go to 31 December or beyond because it is out of its control and they do not want something like this coming out before the election if it is out of its control. The Opposition wants an interim report earlier because it wants this particular controversy to be kept alive and fester in case there is an election in November. That is the truth of what is going on. Kicking this off to a commission of investigation is on one hand a means of deferring it until a certain day, although not because one gets the truth better on one day than on another, and on the other hand a means of keeping it in the public arena and embarrassing the Government.

Both sides see this as a way of taking political advantage. It is what all of us politicians do, but let us tell the truth about it.

One need only consider what is happening down the corridor today, namely, the banking inquiry. It is a neutered and hopeless inquiry that can, in effect, make no findings. It has been called an impartial inquiry to find the truth, but it is really a political vehicle to crucify Fianna Fáil once again. The game is to bring in Mr. Brian Cowen, Mr. Charlie McCreevy and Mr. Bertie Ahern, but only last thing before the election. No one should be naive enough to believe that inquiries of this sort are set up in sole pursuit of the truth. They are established for political advantage or to escape a political down side.

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