Face the music, Mr Noonan - PAC investigate Nama

ANY political party with realistic ambitions of office must at least give lip-service to the idea of transparency. 

Tragically, that promise seems honoured more in the breach than in its delivery. Active, hermetically sealed secrecy is the default position adopted by most governments on most issues. Political handlers might prefer to describe it as discretion, driven by security obligations. They, rightly, argue it is justified and it would be foolish to ignore that hard-earned pragmatism.

However, everything from Hillary Clinton’s emails’ purge, the statement by Bertie Ahern that Government had no over-sight of the Revenue’s tax ruling on Apple, and toxic suspicions around Nama suggest that the principle of transparency carries little or no weight at critical moments.