Irish Examiner View: Time to reassert openness and reject FOI limits

Access to government decisions must be allowed to give opportunity for public scrutiny

In recent weeks Simon Coveney has had to adjust and explain his position on the appointment of Katherine Zappone to the UN special envoy position.

In a networked world it is always a good idea to be aware of what the neighbours are up to, and certainly so when changes are being mooted in nearby jurisdictions which affect freedom of access to information.

Just across the sea, Britain has a new information commissioner-in-waiting, John Edwards, whose preliminary mood music includes the idea (rejected five years ago) that applicants who want to know what exists in official records should bear a greater burden of the costs of retrieval. There already exists the ability to levy a charge for photocopies and postage — quaintly called “disbursements” — but Mr Edwards has a different order of magnitude in mind.