The Taoiseach misunderstands my question. We are quite happy with the pro cedures in Departments regarding the application of the Act. My question related to the guidelines, which have been promised for over five years now. When will those guidelines, which relate to the keeping of written records by civil servants, be promulgated by the Government? Unless records are kept, the Freedom of Information Act is a fairly idle mechanism. According to the Taoiseach's reply there were no records available in response to ten requests.
To put it bluntly, in some of the Scandinavian countries which led the way on this, freedom of information legislation operates indifferently because less records are now kept than prior to the implementation of the legislation. This is a promise made by the Government going back over four and a half years – that guidelines would be promulgated by the Taoiseach and the Secretary General of his Department setting out when and in what circumstances the need to keep written records would not apply, in what circumstances written records would have to apply and the nature of those records. Will the Taoiseach answer that question? He has avoided answering it so far.