Chief whip responds to Lowry over meetings

The Government does not plan to issue guidelines for ministers on holding meetings with individuals named in tribunals according to the chief whip, Paul Kehoe.

The Wexford TD was reacting to independent TD Micheal Lowry who claimed to have been the subject of “reckless and irresponsible comment” in recent days.

Mr Lowry issued a statement to “set the record straight” following controversy over his meeting with Environment Minister Phil Hogan, a meeting which has been the subject of comments from Labour and Fine Gael TDs in the past week.

It took place shortly after Mr Lowry was found by the Moriarty Tribunal to have played a “pervasive and insidious” role in the process to award a second mobile phone licence during his time in Government.

Yesterday, Mr Lowry said he was not found to be corrupt by the tribunal, but had been “roundly condemned as a convicted criminal by the media and by various political opportunists”. He said his “basic rights” of fairness, procedure and due process “have been trampled on mercilessly” and “the presumption of innocence no longer exists in Ireland”.

The Tipperary North TD and former minister said “recent comments made by various individuals which have sought to criticise the Gardaí for apparently not properly pursuing their inquiries are wholly disingenuous and completely improper”.

“Those crawling over one another to stake a claim to the high moral ground would be well advised to stop attempting to interfere with the independence of the DPP and the gardaí and also stop seriously prejudicing my right to due process.”

In a statement on Sunday, Justice Minister Alan Shatter said that, following an examination of the Moriarty Report, the Garda Commissioner was consulting with the DPP “as to whether aspects of it may be pursued from a criminal point of view”.

He said: “Persons named in tribunal reports have no lesser nor greater rights when it comes to the criminal law than anyone else.”

It followed comments from Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte, who said on Sunday that he found it difficult to understand why it was taking so long “come to conclusions on this matter”.

Mr Lowry said the findings of the tribunal were just “an opinion”, which was not true.