Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Minister might tell me why he has not dealt with the solicitor in this matter. Why has he not dealt with the people in the Department before now?

On 22 June last, I asked the Minister if he had "complete confidence" in the Garda Commissioner. This was over a year after we found out what had gone on at the O'Higgins commission of investigation and what Nóirín O'Sullivan had tried to do to Maurice McCabe in the context of the Mullingar meeting, whereby a story was fabricated in order to throw him under the bus. How was the Minister able to reply to me that day by saying he had "full confidence in the Garda Commissioner as she proceeds with the implementation of the most ambitious programme of reform ever embarked on by An Garda Síochána"? If the Minister thought earlier this year that Nóirín O'Sullivan was the right woman for the job, how in God's name can he be the right man to change how we do things around policing and in the Department of Justice and Equality? What is going to change? Is the Minister not part of the old school? I do not understand it. Can the Minister explain how he had 100% confidence in Nóirín O'Sullivan earlier this year?

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