O’Brien ordered to explain false claim records didn’t exist
HOUSING Minister Darragh O’Brien is under pressure from Ceann Comhairle Seán Ó Fearghaíl to explain why he tried to conceal spending plans in his department.
The Ceann Comhairle is at the centre of another dispute between Mr O’Brien and Sinn Féin Housing spokesman Eoin Ó Broin.
The latest row centres on Mr O’Brien’s refusal to release a breakdown of individual spending programmes of the department’s spending for 2024. At Budget time, the Abridged Estimates Volume (AEV) is published, which includes programme level spending in the department. Mr Ó Broin asked for detailed granular expenditure plans as provided in the Revised Estimates Volume (REV). The spending data have been released annually to Mr Ó Broin since 2018 but he was refused when he asked for it after last October’s budget.
In December, Mr Ó Broin wrote to the Ceann Comhairle, telling him ‘the Minister continues to refuse to provide information that was previously provided by this Minister and his predecessor’, and sought his help. It followed a refusal through the parliamentary questions process TDs can use to get information from departments and ministers.
Although the minister replied ‘there is no such thing’ in relation to the document requested, this week Mr Ó Broin was given the data after submitting a Freedom of Information request.
The eventual release of the records prompted Mr Ó Broin to again write to the Ceann Comhairle saying it was ‘deeply unfortunate’ he had to go through the FOI process and add to the ‘workload of already-stretched Departmental staff ’.
Mr Ó Broin also raised what he deemed a ‘quite serious’ issue about the minister’s claim there was ‘no such thing’, saying: ‘I do not understand why the minister would tell you that these documents “do not exist” when the FOI return clearly shows that they do. This is not an academic matter as there is a significant public interest in tracking expenditure allocations from abridged estimates announced on Budget Day, to revised estimates agreed in December, and indeed to further revised estimates agreed some months later and supplementary estimates, in last year’s case agreed last November.
‘Part of my job as Opposition housing spokesperson is to track this expenditure and bring issues of public interest to light in the Dáil or media.
‘For the minister to try and deny access to documents that exist is clearly not acceptable. But for the minister to state, in official correspondence to the Ceann Comhairle, that these records do not exist, when clearly, they do, is altogether another issue,’ he wrote.
The Ceann Comhairle said this week he is ‘trenchantly opposed to members being directed, or forced, to use the FOI system’. He said he does ‘not understand why the minister could contend that the requested information doesn’t exist’, adding: ‘I am sure there may be a logical explanation for this, which I hope will be forthcoming from the minister, as a matter of urgency.’
A spokeswoman for Minister O’Brien told the Irish Daily Mail: ‘The record created to assist the deputy also clarifies that the AEV is a programme level only publication.’
Mr Ó Broin wrote to the Ceann Comhairle last week calling for Minister O’Brien to correct the Dáil record after claiming he ‘misled’ it in a debate when he said 42% of those in emergency accommodation were ‘not entitled’ to social housing instead of not having an active social housing application. Mr O’Brien said he did not mislead the House and rejects the accusation.
‘Against making members use FOIs’