Alan Kelly (Tipperary, Labour)
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483. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality if all documents, departmental emails, private emails, phone call logs, text messages and all other communications that relate to the terms of reference of the Charleton tribunal from his former predecessor, their two advisers, their private secretary, the retired Secretary General and the current and retired staff in the policing division have been sent to the Charleton tribunal in view of the request of An Taoiseach for a trawl to be conducted in his Department and his subsequent comments in Dáil Éireann on 6 December 2017; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [54367/17]

Charles Flanagan (Laois, Fine Gael)
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Since its establishment, the Department of Justice and Equality has cooperated and continues to cooperate with the Disclosures Tribunal.  This has been an ongoing collaborative process which has involved the full compliance by my Department with several orders of the Tribunal as well as extensive voluntary disclosure.  In some cases it has been necessary for legal reasons for the Department to draw the Tribunal's attention to particular documentation in order that the Tribunal make a formal order for its discovery or production.  The Tribunal has positively acknowledged the cooperation of the Department, and that cooperation will be maintained for as long as the work of the Tribunal continues.  As Mr Justice Charleton himself stated last week, discovery is an ongoing process.

My Department does not maintain a log of telephone calls, SMS messages etc.  However, following further correspondence with the Tribunal over recent weeks, a search of all relevant Departmental files and databases, and all Departmental emails, has been undertaken.  A number of independent documentary counsel have been engaged in examining the outcomes of that search with a view to identifying any documents that may be of relevance to the Tribunal and forwarding them to it.

As the Deputy will be aware, Mr Michael Collins SC is carrying out an independent review of the practices and procedures employed by my Department in response to requests for documents from the Disclosures Tribunal.  His report will be produced and considered in the near future and it may also advise on what further measures, if any, might be taken by the Department.