asked the Minister for Justice if he will print as a White Paper and circulate to members of the Dáil the report from an officer of the Gárda Síochána dated August 17th, 1932, and referring to a charge of assault upon members of the Gárda Síochána by Messrs. Ryan, Gilmore and Lowe then pending, from which report he read an extract in Dáil Eireann on the 9th instant.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Gárda Officers' Report.
I am not prepared to have the report in question printed or circulated.
May I ask why? The Minister referred in a debate to a particular report, and does he not think that in all fair play we ought to have the whole of the report, not a truncated extract from it?
In my opinion, the Deputy is not entitled to ask to have this report printed and circulated. To say that a truncated version of the report was given is not a fair suggestion. There was enough of the report given to answer a quite untrue suggestion, that the prosecution of the men, Ryan, Gilmore and Lowe, for attempted murder and conspiracy to murder was abandoned through political pressure. Enough of this report was read to make it perfectly clear that that prosecution was not proceeded with because the police advised against it.
We have got a very long answer completely dodging the point at issue. If the Minister reads portion of a report, I submit that we are entitled to get the whole report to see if the portion he has read fairly carries out the meaning. I submit to you, sir, as a point of privilege of the members of the House, that when a document is read by a Minister the House is entitled to see the whole document and be able to form its own judgment as to whether the extract which the Minister read fully carries out the real meaning of the report.
Quite recently I had occassion in the House to explain the procedure in reference to documents quoted from and not available to Deputies. Had the Deputy, when the quotation or the citation was made, demanded publication of the whole document, he would have been within his rights. The matter is closed, however, and it is not now permissible to go back over a debate which took place some days ago, and to demand publication of the document.
So there is a rule of the House under which the Minister can shelter himself?
The Deputy should not make that suggestion, if meant to reflect on the Chair.
I beg your pardon. I certainly did not in the slightest way wish to impugn the ruling of the Chair. It is the last thing I would do. I made the comment on the action of the Minister.
If a Deputy, when a document is quoted by a Minister, asks that it be published, the Minister may plead public interest; otherwise the document is normally laid on the Table of the House. If public interest is pleaded against publication, the document should not be further quoted from.
Did not the Minister himself give an undertaking, while the matter was being discussed in the House, that he would, if pressed by any substantial number of members, submit a proposal to the Executive Council that the documents should be published?
I never gave such an undertaking or any undertaking like it. Deputy Fitzgerald-Kenney will not suggest that I gave such an undertaking.
No; what the Minister did undertake was this, or, least, what he led us to believe was that we could have the whole of the Kilrush Inquiry printed but the Minister ran away from that.
The Report is in the printers' hands.
The Minister stated in the House that he would not have it printed. He has changed his mind now, I am delighted to hear it.
It has been in the printers' hands for a week.
On this point of order, might I be allowed to mention that, during the debate on the Army Pensions Bill, when the Leas-Cheann Comhairle was in the Chair, and when certain documents were read in part by the Minister for Defence, I made a request for the publication of those documents and I was not given to understand that I had any right to make such a request and no attention was paid to it?
The Ceann Comhairle is responsible only for his own rulings and in any case the matter mentioned by the Deputy is quite a distinct matter.
In fairness to myself I think it only right that I should say that no request was made for any documents to be tabled. There may have been a request made that they be handed to the Official Reporters or a request made that they be handed across the floor of the House, but no definite request was made that the documents in question should be tabled.
As this is an important matter. I would like to bear out what the Leas-Cheann Comhairle has said. There was no request to me to publish these documents or to hand them around.