Daniel McConnell: Another day, another apology from a Fine Gael minister
Another day, another apology from Fine Gael ministers in Government.
Before many had their breakfast on Thursday, a statement from the office of Tánaiste Leo Varadkar’s press adviser was released via WhatsApp relating to the ongoing Katherine Zappone appointment controversy.
This time it was to explain why officials in his department had told journalists that no records existed in relation to the controversial appointment, only for him to release text messages about it earlier this week.
Mr Varadkar and Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney had exchanged text messages about the impending appointment of Ms Zappone as a UN special envoy, a role that was never advertised and which had yet to be discussed with the Taoiseach.
The statement from Mr Varadkar explained why the text messages had failed to show up in a Freedom of Information request. It said: “I have looked into this with my department. The relevant FOI officer who received the request checked all emails and letters and found no records. I was on annual leave at the time the decision was released and I wasn’t contacted to check my phone for records. We’ll put in place procedures to ensure this does not recur. The relevant records are being sent to the journalists. We are, of course, sorry this happened."
Appearing on on RTÉ at about the same time, former agriculture minister Barry Cowen upped the ante significantly. He said the Taoiseach needed to address the issue regarding the “content” of the texts.
The Laois-Offaly TD was sacked by Mr Martin during the summer of 2020 after a controversy over a four-year-old drink-driving ban.
“I was told that this issue [drink driving] was dominating the public domain and getting in the way of Government business. I would argue that this is getting in the way of difficult Government business too,” Mr Cowen said.
Asked if either Mr Coveney or Mr Varadkar should resign, he said: “If they feel so, that’s their decision. If they don’t feel so, the Taoiseach has a decision to make and that’s his business.”
Appearing in Newry a short while later, Mr Varadkar was pressed on the matter.
In a characteristic bout of self-preservation from the Fine Gael leader, he did his utmost to throw his one-time rival and party colleague Simon Coveney under the proverbial bus.
“From my point of view, I think I have dealt with this matter. I set out very clearly what my involvement was in this appointment which did not take place at the end of the day.
"I have published all the records that I have which I believe verify my account. I was only in contact with Simon Coveney on one occasion on this matter and this was essentially the query that you see,” he said.
Given the Tánaiste’s comments, focus quickly shifted back to Mr Coveney and his ever-changing narrative.
The opposition branded the failed Zappone appointment process a classic example of “cronyism” and the “worst kind” of old-school Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael politics, which promoted insiders, the friends of those in power.
With pressure increasing, Mr Coveney dispatched a three-page letter to Charlie Flanagan, the chair of the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs Committee.
Mr Coveney had said he deleted the texts between himself and Mr Varadkar for security reasons.
He said his phone was hacked in 2020 and other foreign ministers were contacted using his phone’s identity.
He rejected claims he misled members of the committee in evidence given by him earlier this week in relation to the appointment process for Ms Zappone.
“If I was trying to keep texts from the Tánaiste secret, I would not have been the one to tell the committee about those same texts,” he said.
However, his other text messages with Katherine Zappone, also released by his office, show she had told him about the upcoming role in the Department of Foreign Affairs, which at that stage was near finalisation and close to being brought to cabinet.
Mr Coveney, addressing Mr Flanagan, said he was writing because the suggestion has been made in media that he misled the committee.
“The committee’s own records, detailed above, show this is not the case and I completely reject such a suggestion,” he said.
Even with that clarification, the matter still dominated the Government’s Housing For All press conference with both the Taoiseach and Tánaiste getting extremely tetchy with reporters who pressed them about their handling of the saga.
Questions from the ’s Paul Hosford, the ’s Philip Ryan and the ’s Sharon McGowan raised the temperature to which the Taoiseach accused the media of introducing an element of “melodrama” in questioning whether resignations were appropriate or not.
Mr Martin took particular exception when he was asked about his treatment of Mr Cowen and the speech he gave in defence of his decision to sack him. He produced a copy of the full speech and insisted the Cowen situation was not comparable to the Zappone affair.
An equally irritable Tánaiste accused reporters of comparing “apples with oranges”.
He said there was no comparison between the Merrion event, which was not in breach of Government guidelines, and the Golfgate event in Galway, where criminal prosecutions are in train.
All eyes are now on Coveney’s second appearance before the committee and the pending release of the file on this saga from his department due next week.
“We are in a dangerous place,” one senior Government source told me.
Quite the mess of the Government’s own making which simply won’t go away.
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