Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

To answer the Deputy's question, we did authorise, develop and establish this new mechanism for accountability with the Policing Authority. It is an independent body, a point made by many Members of the House when we went through the legislation on it. It would not be right for me to try to prescribe the work of the authority, but I take the point made by the Deputy. I have already said I will refer the report to it. I have no difficulty with having a meeting. I am due to have a meeting with its chairperson and no doubt the fact that the report is being referred to her will form part of the discussion. I stress that the authority is an independent body. The Deputy recognises this. It gets on with its work, but it has indicated that it will discuss the report. I believe it is the right forum in which to do so. Having established an independent body we should allow it to get on with its work.

The Deputy is quoting and commenting extensively on what are, in fact, illegal transcripts. I take the point that they are in the public domain, but we still do not know their context in terms of where they came in the commission evidence, what preceded them and what followed them. In many ways, the publication of such illegal transcripts robs the Garda Commissioner of an opportunity to defend her good name and we must make the point that 94 other witnesses also gave evidence. Yesterday I made the point that protecting the integrity of the commission process was very important because in the future we want people to have confidence in commissions of investigation, the fact that they brief their legal teams and that their issues will be dealt with in a confidential way. The commission held its hearings in private and guaranteed confidentiality, but it now looks like we are rerunning part of the investigation. We are losing sight of the very broad questions in the commission of investigation which need analysis and follow-up. We must ensure they are acted on and that criminal investigations which will take place in the future will be of the standard the commission has stated they will need to be.

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