Ministers out of line, says Ahern

MINISTERS will be warned about abusing their office for party political gain after Taoiseach Bertie Ahern yesterday admitted two of them had recently stepped out of line.

In a u-turn on his previous position, Mr Ahern was critical of both Minister for Education Noel Dempsey and Minister for Labour Affairs Frank Fahey for inappropriate use of departmental resources and breaking ethics guidelines.

Mr Dempsey put together confidential information packs for Fianna Fáil local election candidates using departmental material and Mr Fahey sent out invitations to a party fundraiser on official Department of Enterprise notepaper.

Just last weekend, Mr Ahern dismissed the furore over Mr Dempsey’s pack as “a nothing” and also said he had misunderstood the manner in which the information was presented.

Responding to an accusation from Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny that these actions were an abuse of ministerial office, Mr Ahern accepted the error in Mr Dempsey’s use of Department of Education packs and agreed Mr Fahey had also breached guidelines.

“At this stage I have to accept what you said,” Mr Ahern said to Mr Kenny.

While Mr Ahern said he did not want to see any restriction on the release of information, he said ministers could not use constituency offices or departments for party political purposes.

“The rules are drawn tight now and I will remind my colleagues about them,” he said.

Mr Kenny asked if the ministers were going to apologise for their behaviour, recalling how in 1996 two ministers apologised for a party letter going out on official notepaper.

At the time, Labour’s Eithne Fitzgerald, then the Junior Minister for Finance in the Rainbow Government, sent out invitations to a fundraiser, attended by then Minister for Finance Ruairi Quinn, on official Department of Finance paper. Ms Fitzgerald and Mr Quinn apologised for the incident.

Enquiring about the Progressive Democrats views on the latest ministerial breaches, Mr Kenny said in 1996 Tánaiste Mary Harney had called for resignations.

Mr Ahern merely said it was easy enough for people to make mistakes, but the rules were clear.

The information in Mr Dempsey’s packs was not the problem, Mr Ahern said, but it was sent out in official departmental packs and that was wrong. Accepting the error, Mr Ahern said he had told Mr Dempsey it was wrong.

The information was a breakdown of the school building programme funding for primary and secondary schools up to 2003.

Although Mr Fahey’s letter was sent by his constituency office, it was on departmental notepaper and therefore was in breach of the guidelines.

The country’s ethics watchdog, the Standards in Public Offices Commission, is investigating Mr Dempsey’s actions.