Brian Hayes (Fine Gael)

The intention of the original legislation in 1997 was to let the public see the workings of the decision making process. That was the serious purpose of the Act. The tittle-tattle about Ministers going to Honolulu for St. Patrick's Day and how much it cost and how many they took, the tabloidisation of FOI, was irrelevant. The most significant sections concern decision making.

By excluding committees, expert groups which report to Government and background papers, Ministers are being denied the opportunity to be seen to make decisions independently. I suspect that the Minister for Finance, Deputy McCreevy, is totally opposed to this. He regularly reads reports from expert groups and comes to the totally opposite opinion. He is entitled to do this, he is a politician who stands up and says he disagrees with civil servants and when he stands for election, he takes the rap one way or another. I admire the guts he has shown, although I might not agree with the positions he has taken.

What is so wrong with allowing reports from expert groups being made public, whether an issue is resolved? Senator Mansergh said last night that the views of the taxation strategy group would continue to be published. I would like to hear the Minister of State's view because I doubt they will be.

When tax individualisation was introduced, there was a huge public debate on the issue. We were entitled to know the views of the expert group which helped the Government form opinions. It was good for politics. It is good for the public to see that there is real debate among those who give their views to Ministers. That was the objective of the legislation. All the other stuff about how much trips cost and the class at which a Minister travelled is irrelevant.

This is at the heart of the public knowing about the Government decision making process. By excluding committees from the workings of the FOI regime we are doing a huge disservice to the dissemination of information in the State.