Childers silent on identity of threat
Mystery surrounds the identity of the politician who left the warning on the voicemail of her iPhone, which was stolen in Brussels on Monday night.
Meanwhile, junior minister Roisín Shortall expressed her reservations about the nomination of Mr Cardiff, who was secretary general of the Department of Finance when an accounting error overstated the national debt by €3.6 billion.
Mr Cardiff will next week face a grilling before the European Parliament’s budgetary committee, which has to sanction is appointment.
But several Irish MEPs, including Ms Childers, last week expressed their opposition to his appointment because of the accounting error and because of Mr Cardiff’s association with the previous administration in negotiations on the bank guarantee and bank bailout.
Yesterday Ms Childers said she was threatened with expulsion over her opposition and was told not to give any interviews on the issue.
Last Tuesday she was told by another politician and a party press officer that she might be sued for Mr Cardiff’s loss of earnings if she proceeded with an interview on the RTÉ Six One News.
“A second phonecall happened which I didn’t take, but it’s on my voicemail saying that if I proceeded a recommendation for my expulsion from the party would take place,” she said.
The threat did not come from an official but from a “senior politician”.
Party leader, Eamon Gilmore, said yesterday he had no knowledge of such a phonecall and that nobody in the party needs permission to speak their mind.
Ms Shortall said that while she would be “surprised” if Ms Childers had been gagged, “there are legitimate issues about senior public servants who don’t perform well in their job”.
She said the Government needed to bring in “a more accountable regime in relation to the employment of senior public servants”.
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