Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Minister for laying out the vast amount of taxpayers' money the Government is using to fight the European Commission to ensure we do not get €14 billion of money it believes we are owed. It would be laughable were it not so serious. Many areas could do with a touch of that €14 billion, on which the Government is spending millions of euro of our money to ensure we never get. The Data Protection Commissioner and the Information Commissioner have laid bare the Minister's deception. There are no rules that would prevent him from releasing the information he is now withholding. The Government is misusing procedure and deliberately misinterpreting rules to hide its true intentions. GDPR is meant to protect consumers. It is not supposed to be used to hide efforts to help millionaires or billionaires rip off the Irish people. The Office of the Information Commissioner stated that data protection legislation does not prohibit the release of personal information relating to third parties. The Data Protection Commission, DPC, has gone even further than that and provided details similar to the ones I am seeking today, for which many Members have been asking for many months. It has provided information on both firms and individual barristers. It did so after GDPR came into effect, and I think the Data Protection Commissioner is more of an expert on data protection than the rest of us. Given what I have said and based on the rulings of the DPC, does the Minister not believe it is now appropriate for him to put all the information on the record of this House?

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