Author: gavin

New privacy law will clarify existing rights

It’s an important part of the constitution, and clarifying existing rights will be a good thing. But will it take into account online rights?

Ideally, the Minister would have liked to publish his defamation legislation first and then act later to turn the Murray report into law, but he accepted that there was no point pushing the matter.

The Cabinet has now decided that the recommendations included in the Murray report should be turned into the heads of a Bill – the main points – in two, or three weeks.

The timetable is not without ambition, since drafting such a piece of legislation – even in its abbreviated form – may prove no easy task for parliamentary draughtsmen. Though some observers suspect a major rift between the Minister and Fianna Fáil Ministers, the reality is more prosaic, since both sides are agreed on the destination.

Though some in Fianna Fáil might believe that extra privacy rights are on the way, that is not the case, since the legislation to come will bring greater clarity to rights already in existence under the European Court of Human Rights and the Irish Constitution.

Though they exist, the public is entirely unaware of them. A better-informed public, backed by a clearly-written piece of Irish law – could yet occasionally put manners on misbehaving journalists, and, perhaps, in the future prevent the publication of something that would have been better unpublished.

Gardai examine hundreds of phone records

Interesting to see how ‘official’ phone bugging is going..

Hundreds of private telephone records are being examined by the Garda Síochána every month, the Data Protection Commissioner said

Gardai currently are entitled to get access to the records during inquiries about any crime, regardless of its seriousness, said the commissioner, Billy Hawkes, who published his annual report yesterday.

An initial request for the records of one individual suspected of criminality can frequently provoke requests for the records of every individual listed on the suspect’s file, he added.

“Just make sure that you don’t ring the number of a major criminal by mistake, or you could find that your records are listed,” he told journalists yesterday, though he emphasised that there is no evidence that the gardaí were improperly using their powers.

The inspection of a citizen’s telephone records should not be the “first option, or a routine option” for the Garda.

Under proposed EU legislation, which is being opposed by Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, telephone records would have to be stored for between six months and two years in all EU member states, but they would be made available to police only during serious crime investigations.

€975 a day for payroll experts

The PPARS debacle rolls on:

Computer experts hired through a mystery offshore company to work on the failed PPARS payroll system for the health service were being paid up to €975 a day.

Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information act show that consultants supplied by Blackmore Group Assets (BGAL) were receiving monthly payments that in some cases amounted to €30,000 — the average annual industrial wage in Ireland.

Nine people were contracted through BGAL and worked on the PPARS project from 2002 to 2004.

The same story was reported in the Examiner last year, after a probe by Fine Gael into Blackmore Group Assets.

Company awarded N6 contract caught in corruption probe

An interesting case from America:

Two employees of Jacobs Engineering, a multinational construction company, were convicted last year in America for their role in obtaining confidential details of competitors’ bids for an $800m (€650m) building project.

During the trial it was alleged that Jacobs’ employees got inside information about rival bids for a convention centre in Chicago from a lobbying company it was paying. It subsequently won the contract, worth $11.5m (€9m), after reducing its estimate by more than one-third.

Last week Jacobs’ Irish arm, which lists American and Canadian-based directors on its accounts, was awarded the tender to provide engineering, procurement and construction services for a 20km stretch of road on the N6 between Ballinasloe and Athlone.

The National Roads Authority (NRA), one of the bodies that awarded the contract, said it was unaware of the corruption investigation, conducted by the US attorney’s office. It said the tendering process it adopts is rigorously checked and all candidates are vetted for their ability to successfully and efficiently carry out a contract. There is no suggestion of any impropriety in relation to the N6 tender.

What John White alleged

Here are some parts of the transcripts from Morris. Morris reacted with exasperation that Gardai may be bugging solicitors.

Chair: You have mentioned bugging and similar type activities?
White: There was Chairman, yes
Chair: Are you aware of other members who actually witnessed this type of unauthorized activity?
White: I would be aware from experience, Chairman, of particular members in Dublin. But in relation to bugging and perhaps this is of no interest to you, but it is of interest to me, it’s outside of Donegal but Sargeant Thomas Murphy and Garda James McGrath did witness bugging of an interview room and they were beside the man and the machine and they can name the man that was using it and the made statements to that effect. They cam to the Tribunal here one day and they met me at the back of the Tribunal in the corner there some time ago, maybe a year and a half ago, and they told me that they were quite willing to give evidence about all this. It was in a murder case in Cork in ’92 and they can definitely give sworn evidence that the interview room was bugged and they saw it happening and they heard it happening.
Chair: Are they prepared to come forward and confirm that to the Tribunal?
White: They are and they have made statements to their own superintendent about it. There was supposed to be an investigation but I believe it was a cover-up – – well they believe it was a cover-up and they have told me that. They have all the reports, all the documentation necessary to show that.

Ref 747:

McDermott: Just in relation to the bugging issue and the reference which you made in the broader sense to the existence of bugging in other circumstances, on other occasions and the one incident that you were able to concretize in relation to the Chairman in relation to the Cork matter?
White: Yes
McDermott: And the two men you named, and we won’t name again. I have asked for a search to be done in relation to correspondence to the Tribunal and just as a matter of record, one of the gentlemen did initially write to the Tribunal concerning a matter in Cork relating to bugging and was told by the Tribunal that it was outside the Terms of Reference of the Tribunal. Of course strictly speaking it was. Now, your allegation in relation to the bugging, the generalized bugging issue is now a much wider allegation as and of course what you are saying now is in relation to that particular incident is that as far as you are concerned, it is an example of your general allegation that this was widespread throughout the force; isn’t that right?
White: Yes. Mr. McDermott, that’s right.
McDermott: Thereby making what well may be or may have been deemed to be a matter outside the Terms of Reference relevant to your presentation to the Tribunal. That’s why you are referring to it; is that right?
White: Very strongly, Chairman, yes. I find it very difficult to get people to come forward in relation to this. That is one particular situation. I would very much appreciate if the Tribunal would hear evidence in the future.

Ref 288:

White: Chairman, at this stage it would be appropriate for the senior Garda authority to come clean in relation to bugging. It cannot be covered up. There are at least two hundred men alive at the moment, and women, probably a lot more, who know exactly what went on over the years, some of them are still serving in the job, and to try and cover it up on a nationwide scale, it can’t be done. It just can’t be done. It did happen. The equipment was bought and purchased at extensive cost to do it. It was not a universal approach, in certain cases they were done and it’s not just down to interview rooms. It’s houses, cars, apartments and phones. And it’s done illegally, totally illegally, and the senior Garda authority know this is the case. I know that I am saying it on oath. I can give you specific – in the next module.
Chair: Sargeant White, what concerns me is the suggestion, more than a suggestion, the statement that is apparently before, that solicitors consultation were being bugged.
White: Yes.
Chair: Whether listening devices are used outside of that –
White: Oh yes.
Chair: – is a matter that I haven’t got to concern myself with. But I do have to concern myself with the allegation that in these particular cases the solicitors’ consultations were bugged.
White: Yes
Chair: You’re saying that happened
White: It happened
Chair: And you saying that it happened as a matter of practice elsewhere; is that correct?
White: Yes
Chair: Solicitors’ consultations?
White: In face I personally heard, Chairman, that one priest was bugged talking to a prisoner. I can give the name of the prisoner. It’s quite some time ago.
Chair: Solicitors, is that what we are talking about?
White: Right, yes. Yes, of course to try and glean any information that would progress the investigation. It wouldn’t be used afterwards, it couldn’t be used obviously, look, I did it but I’m not going to say a word, I am going to keep quiet. Then you’d be on the right track, you couldn’t use it but it would be a great help.
Chair: And that was done with the knowledge and approval of senior officers, you’re saying?
White: It would be done, yes, with the D/I or the D/Super in the area.

An issue for bloggers?

The Morris Tribunal has recently made transcriptions available to the public. The day I have been most interested in of late is Day 434. It occurs to me that certain aspects of placing this material online have not occurred to the Tribunal.

For example at Ref 666:

Chairman Morris:

…So I’m going to make a request to the media for the moment that those names be excluded from any reports there may be. By all means report in full the contents of what Sargeant White has said, but please do avoid using the names in a way that would identify the two people involved until such time as we have had an oppurtunity of considering where we go from there.

But the two Gardai are clearly named by White a paragraph above. What do bloggers do in this situation?

Gardai 'never told to be aggressive in interviews'

The Irish Independent reports that a superintendent from Donegal has said that John White had not been given instructions to engage in tough interviews – contrary to what John White alleges.

John McGinley, who retired after being criticised in a Morris Tribunal report, said Det Sgt John White had not been given instructions to engage in tough interviews while probing Richie Barron’s death. “There were no instructions given to anybody to go outside the just treatment of persons in custody rules, or Criminal Justice Act of ’84, in any shape or form,” he told the tribunal.

“These structures are in place to ensure that such abuses don’t happen, I am disappointed and saddened that it did happen, as alleged.

“However, if two people go into an interview room and do something such as that there is very little that anybody can do about it at the time.”

The Irish Examiner reports the same story here.

Garda denies threatening woman with seven years in jail

Another Garda has denied that Brolly and McConnel were mistreated in Garda custody, Sean Herraghty:

“It was just said in general chat that if she was convicted she could get seven years,” Mr Herraghty said. “There was no threat involved.” He agreed it probably would unnerve a prisoner a little.

Asked if it was calculated to do so, he replied: “Possibly, yes.”

Ms Brolly made complaints of mistreatment while in custody against Det Garda Dooley and Det Sgt John White who have admitted they mistreated her and her sister Róisín McConnell.

Centre for Public Inquiry has ceased its work

The Centre for Public Inquiry has decided to close. As reported in several papers on Monday, Fergus Flood said there was “no alternative”. There were also allegations that Treasury Holdings was threatening legal action against the CPI and its members if a report was published naming them, in relation to the Dublin Port Company (DPC) deal. The Sunday Times reported:

The CPI began an investigation into property transactions in Dublin’s docklands, including a deal involving the Dublin Port Company (DPC), and other developments including Treasury Holdings’ joint venture with CIE on Spencer Dock.

The government has already come under pressure to explain why the state-owned DPC, chaired by former councillor Joe Burke, a political associate of Bertie Ahern, the taoiseach, did not go through a tender procedure before entering into a joint venture with private operators to develop a 32-acre site.

An apparent source at the CPI also noted:

“Various interesting operations are in progress which will never see the light of day because people are afraid to be sued for libel.”