The leaking of this document is a betrayal of both communities in Northern Ireland and a betrayal of the entire Irish people. It appears that the document was in circulation at official level within the Department of Foreign Affairs. The exact extent of its circulation is not quite clear or the number of officials to whom it has been circulated. I expect the Tánaiste will indicate the exact number of officials to whom it was circulated and give their names in response to this debate.
My understanding is that there has never been an occasion in the history of Irish diplomacy since the State was founded in 1922 when a document of the nature of the one in question was leaked to the press. Irish Governments and Ministers for Foreign Ministers have been engaged in the most difficult negotiations in the past, dating back to the negotiations for the Treaty, the negotiations for the Statute of Westminster and negotiations for various Anglo-Irish agreements through the thirties, the forties and the fifties to the negotiation of the Irish accession to the European Community.
I am not aware of any case where a Minister for Foreign Affairs presided over a leak of this kind in the past on any occasion in Irish diplomatic history. It is a matter of extreme seriousness because it should be remembered that if an Irish position paper circulating within the Department can be leaked, so also could a paper circulated to the Irish Government by another Government be leaked. If there are people in the Department of Foreign Affairs or in the Government service who are capable of leaking their own Government's paper, they are also capable of leaking papers supplied by other Governments. This fact undermines the confidence that other Governments will have, and should have, in their dealings with the Irish Government. Therefore, I believe this is not a matter that can be treated as any other type of leak. It is not like an internal leak of documents from another Department concerning solely our domestic affairs. A document leaked in regard to foreign relations creates a precedent which could be used to leak documents supplied by other Governments and, therefore, could totally undermine the trust upon which Irish diplomacy must rest.
Furthermore, I believe in the case of this particular subject, the most sensitive subject with which we have dealt for many years in Ireland — the creation of an atmosphere of peace and reconciliation on this island — that the people with whom the Tánaiste is now dealing, namely, the British Government, will wonder what is really happening here. They will wonder what is the motive for this leak. They will wonder not only who did it, but why did they do it. They will suspect an ulterior motive; they will suspect things that may well be completely unfounded. But until we know exactly who leaked it and why, those suspicions will continue.
In particular I should like to know how long this document has been in existence? For example, has it been in existence for a number of days, a number of months or a number of weeks? I should like to know exactly to whom was it circulated. Was it circulated outside the Irish public service or solely within it? Was it circulated to established civil servants only or also to temporary civil servants?
I should also like to know exactly what the Tánaiste knew about this matter and what the Taoiseach knew about this matter. I should like to know if the Tánaiste can tell the House whether the leaking of this document and its timing had anything to do with the Taoiseach's visit to Derry, because it is quite obvious that the Taoiseach was placed in an impossibly embarrassing position of having to respond to questions about a document that it is plain that the leaker knew the Taoiseach had not seen. Therefore, the Taoiseach was placed in a worse position than I believe any Taoiseach was placed in a matter of this kind in recent memory. While I have had occasion to criticise the Taoiseach on many matters in the past, the person who was responsible for this leak placed him in a grossly unfair position. That is a matter for which somebody must take responsibility.
I should like to remind everyone in this House, in particular the Tánaiste, that this Government and every Government it has succeeded has been based on a number of constitutional doctrines. One of those doctrines is absolute and total ministerial responsibility for everything that happens within a Minister's own Department. Civil servants are not separately accountable for what happens. Civil servants do not have to resign because of what happens. The current doctrine — I believe it is a doctrine that is somewhat unrealistic but is one that successive Governments have insisted on continuing — says that one person, and one person only, is responsible for everything that happens within his or her Department and that person is the Minister. The Minister in this case, if the document's circulation had been confined to the Department of Foreign Affairs, is the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and no one else.
Therefore I want to know, and the House wants to know, what the Tánaiste will do about this. What personal steps, as Minister, will he take to put this right? When will he be reporting back to the House on this matter and, if he is not going to be in a position to report back to this House, what will he do about his own position in regard to this issue?