Written answers

Wednesday, 30 April 2014

Department of Justice and Equality

Commissions of Investigation

Photo of Mick WallaceMick Wallace (Wexford, Independent)
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14. To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality if he forward a document which summarises the differences between the Verrimus report and the RITS peer review regarding GSOC bugging; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [19270/14]

Photo of Alan ShatterAlan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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During my appearance before the Joint Committee on Pubic Service, Oversight and Petitions on 19 February 2014 to discuss reports that the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission may have been subject to unlawful surveillance, I undertook to see if I could provide the Committee with any details of the main points of potential difference between the Verrimus report provided by GSOC and the related expert opinion by RITS provided to my Department.

As I explained at the hearing, and in a subsequent letter to the Committee of 11 March, 2014, I am very conscious that retired High Court Judge John Cooke has been appointed to conduct an independent inquiry into the reports of unlawful surveillance of GSOC. I am anxious not to say or do anything which could be seen as in any way trespassing upon this independent inquiry, so I am constrained in what I can say, especially as neither the Verrimus nor the RITS reports have been published and both are among the documents being examined by the inquiry.

In my letter to the Committee of 11 March 2014 I provided information on the main issues identified by RITS. In a subsequent letter to the Committee on 7 April, 2014 I further explained that to go beyond this would, I believe, effectively require making public the report and the expert opinion, or at least key elements of them, at a time when these confidential documents form a critical part of the material under inquiry by Judge Cooke. As indicated in that letter, I would suggest that, in circumstances where the report of Judge Cooke is expected shortly, it would be best at this stage to await his findings.

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