Clare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Five weeks ago the Tánaiste referred two very serious protected disclosures by two senior gardaí to a retired judge, Mr. Justice Iarfhlaith O'Neill, for urgent inquiry. The disclosures, in which it was alleged the Garda Commissioner, Ms Nóirín O'Sullivan, was directly involved in a systematic and organised campaign to discredit the whistleblower Sergeant Maurice McCabe with colleagues, politicians and journalists, were due to be investigated by the former judge, who is due to conclude and report back next week. However, he was given no powers of compellability and no terms of reference. Attempts made by other whistleblowers to have their cases heard also, as they too have been the victims of bullying and harassment since making protected disclosures, were ignored, despite the fact that their testimony and experiences were current. They go to the very heart of the systemic problem in An Garda Síochána - what is said in public and what is done privately are entirely different. It was hardly an auspicious start to the inquiry when this was its foundation. One would be forgiven for thinking it was put together as a fig leaf for the Minister to take cover behind for her lack of action in this regard. This view has been strengthened as we find out that with a week to go to the issuing of his report, the former judge has not requested any material from either of the two whistleblowers. He has not met or even spoken to either man. In fact, the only interaction was request, approximately two weeks ago, to their legal teams to pass on the protected disclosure to the Garda Commissioner. We could not make it up.

What sort of inquiry does the Minister honestly expect us to believe this is? While this has been going on, we have had the Garda Commissioner appear at the justice committee with senior officers who are at the heart of many of the protected disclosure complaints. At the same meeting she misled the committee by stating she was not privy to information on a campaign of harassment against any member of the force when she was actually in direct receipt of 14 letters outlining precisely the situation. She has been the subject of a detailed section 41 complaint on which the Minister has been briefed. We are awaiting GSOC's finding. She has lost the support of the ranks of the force by intervening in a partisan way in their legitimate pay claim with threats of martial law. Why has the Tánaiste allowed the situation to continue to crisis point? On what basis does she believe she has the right to delegate to retired judges, GSOC and the courts functions that are her responsibility in law, namely, to hold the Commissioner to account?

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