Mick Wallace on how Alan Shatter handles controversy

Alan Shatter’s handling of controversies, failing to cleanly address each issue, has led to their escalation into full-blown political crises, writes Mick Wallace.

FACING a no-confidence motion last week, Minister for Justice Alan Shatter told the House he found it “extraordinary” that the focus of the criticism against him during this latest Garda crisis is on the timing of the receipt of a letter from the ex–commissioner, Martin Callinan, and on when he was informed of its contents, and to when he first had actual sight of the letter.

I’d like to clear this up for him: the reason for this focus is that if we find it difficult to swallow this part of this very curious tale, then the truth of rest of the story, and the roles played by the various protagonists are clearly also in doubt.

In fact, it is becoming more and more difficult for politicians on both sides of the House — and more importantly for the citizens of this country — to accept the minister’s word on anything. Some examples from the last week alone include:

- The minister’s failure to make good on his commitment during his appearance at the Committee on Public Oversight to forward a letter that properly explains the detail of the differences between the GSOC Verrimus report into GSOC bugging and the Rits report commissioned by the minister, a report which the minister assured us cleared up all those silly bugging suspicions, but which he conveniently could not share with the committee for reasons of state security.

- The minister’s speech on the Garda Inspectorate report last week was his usual less-than-frank form of parliamentary disclosure: The minister implied that he always intended to forward the two internal Garda reports into penalty points to the Garda Inspectorate and that he had arranged this with the Garda Inspectorate long in advance of the publication of those reports in April/May 2013.

In reality this is far more likely to have been a hasty decision to deal with lingering political pressure, to see if he could impart a sheen of legitimacy to the internal reports, where we had senior gardaí investigating themselves without any input from the whistleblowers. Indeed, page eight of the Garda Inspectorate report itself sets out that the two Garda reports were actually referred to them on July 4.

- The minister’s meaningless and self-serving apology to the whistleblowers in the House was later followed in the same speech by him re-emphasising that the whistleblowers had not been proven right in relation to all of their allegations.

He could not help himself but point out that no report has found the whistleblowers to be correct in the more serious allegations connected with fatal accidents. In fact, these allegations were outside the remit of the Garda Inspectorate report and the Comptroller and Auditor General’s report.

These allegations have only ever been examined in the O’Mahoney report, a report which is now largely discredited, and which did not publish the supporting evidence for its conclusions in the appendices of that report, even in redacted form.

- The compromise that was reached with Labour to introduce an independent police board will be difficult to implement if the minister is at the helm of this reform. He is on record only last July saying that such a board was unnecessary and would be anti-democratic.

Our proposals for such a board last July in our 37-page Garda Bill were dismissed at second stage by Fine Gael, Labour and Fianna Fáil. Against this background, any Independent Police Board introduced is likely to be ineffective and to be established on the weakest possible legislative basis.

nAnother issue with the bizarre explanations surrounding the timing of the letter and state of knowledge of the various parties is that these insights indicate at the very least that the minister runs his department in an incompetent and dysfunctional way.

The minister lamented in the Dáil that he is unfairly accused of arrogance — I couldn’t care less about his arrogance, if he conducted himself appropriately in the exercise of his ministerial duties in overseeing the administration of justice and the fair application of the rule of law in the State.

The minister and the Government say the recent Garda crises are not of the minister’s making. And I agree wholeheartedly with them. The real issue is the disastrous and defensive way in which each crisis has been dealt with. The real issue is that the abysmal handling of each crisis, the failure to cleanly, quickly and openly address and investigate each issue has led to the escalation of each into a full-blown political crisis. This failure to investigate and address issues promptly has spilled over into other areas also, including:

- The failure to deal properly and fairly with the survivors of the Magdalene Laundries;

- The failure to deal properly with survivors of symphysiotomy forcing these women to seek redress within the UN Human Rights structure;

- The failure to address the allegations of Sarah Bland (the Laois woman claims she was subjected to ritual abuse by an Irish paedophile ring);

- The failure to recognise Traveller ethnicity;

- The refusal to reform the bifurcated immigration procedure and to do away with the inhumane system of Direct Provision which the minister so gallantly spoke against when in opposition.

These are the facts — facts that unfortunately jar with the Coalition mantra of the mythical “Reforming Minister”.

This minister has proved himself to be a reactionary and not a reforming minister, one will only act when his own political survival depends on it. Strong and courageous political leadership is needed to tackle the series of Garda crises but, unfortunately, the common perception now is that this is a minister that we cannot trust.

Mr Shatter’s defensive and obstinate approach to dealing with these crises has led to serious damage in public trust and confidence to the institutions of the State — the Garda, GSOC and the idea that justice is fairly administered have all been undermined. He has damaged the reputation of the Department of Justice, the Attorney General’s office — and Fine Gael’s reputation as the party of law and order.

The “appalling vista” before us relates not only to the potential issues within the criminal justice system. The “appalling vista” that Fine Gael can now lay claim to is a new era of ministerial irresponsibility:

- Where being on holidays and not being physically handed a letter for two weeks is a legitimate excuse for inaction;

- Where, so long as a minister is not aware of a working group within his department, he is not responsible for dealing with the issues within it;

- Where ministers need only stick to a practice of not asking questions to escape political accountability;

- Where blaming the previous Government or the inherited legislative structure is an acceptable excuse;

- Where incompetence is an acceptable and legitimate excuse for ministerial inaction.

It appears Fine Gael’s traditional loyalty to the Garda will be tested this week and the proof of the pudding will be clear from the terms of reference for the proposed inquiry.

If these terms ask only for an examination of the role of An Garda Síochána in relation to this Garda tapes controversy, then it is Fine Gael who are looking to make a political football of the Garda.

To get to the truth, the terms of reference must also include an examination of the policies, conduct and extent of knowledge – current and historical — of the Department of Justice, the AG’s Office and the current and previous ministers of justice.

After the initial flowery statements of fulsome praise last week when the Garda commissioner was sacrificed to ensure the political survival of this government, the mist has now cleared. We now see the real strategy emerging and the despicable compromise reached by Labour and Fine Gael.

I was never a fan of the commissioner, but it is unfair of Labour and of Fine Gael to anoint him as their designated fall guy for the Labour AG and the Fine Gael minister respectively.

Transport Minister Leo Varadkar announced last week that the Garda commissioner was at fault for failing to keep Mr Shatter informed of the Garda Tapes controversy.

And Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte told the House that, really, it was the Garda commissioner who was at fault for failing to inform the Labour-appointed AG.

And the Government accuses opposition TDs of playing politics with the Garda issues.

* Mick Wallace in an independent TD.