Top mandarin grilled on mole and Zappone

THE country’s top civil servant has said he ‘wishes people wouldn’t leak from Cabinet’ but refused to answer questions on whether the Government has issues with confidentiality.

Martin Fraser, the secretary general at the Department of the Taoiseach and secretary to the Government, appeared in front of the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs Committee yesterday evening to discuss the controversial appointment of Katherine Zappone to a special UN envoy post.

The Cabinet signed off on Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney’s proposal to appoint the former children’s minister to the ‘special envoy on freedom of opinion and expression’ position on July 27.

Ms Zappone later turned down the role after a backlash at the Government’s hiring process and the fallout from her Merrion Hotel party, which Tánaiste Leo Varadkar attended just days before her appointment.

Mr Fraser was questioned by Sinn Féin’s John Brady on Cabinet confidentiality after news of Ms Zappone’s appointment was shared by a journalist on Twitter before the July 27 meeting was over. Mr Fraser repeatedly refused to answer questions on whether he thought the current Government has issues with leaks. ‘I’m a civil servant. I really don’t want to get into arguments for or against the Government. I can’t start talking about this Government, or that government or other governments,’ he said.

After persistent questioning,

Mr Fraser confirmed that he had been asked to carry out an investigation into the leaking of a confidential report into the mother and baby homes in January.

He added that he has not been able to find the source of the leak and that he was ‘not optimistic’ that he would. He said that he had not been asked to investigate who leaked details of the Zappone appointment.

When asked if he had spoken to the gardaí about alleged leaks, Mr Fraser said that he ‘wasn’t going to get into the ins and outs of that’. The secretary general revealed that he had been asked to investigate ‘two or three’ leaks in his time in the role.

He added: ‘On no occasion have I been able to locate the person who did it. There are people who know who they are but I’m afraid I am not one of those people.’

Deputy Brady was later reprimanded by committee chair Charlie Flanagan, of Fine Gael, who told him his questioning was outside of the committee’s remit and that he was being ‘politically mischievous’.

Mr Fraser said he could not be sure whether or not he knew about Ms Zappone’s appointment before Minister Coveney brought the memo to Cabinet.

He told Social Democrats TD Gary Gannon that the first time he ‘knew for certain of the role’ was the evening before the July 27 meeting when he received information from the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Mr Fraser said Mr Coveney followed the correct procedure but a mistake had been made that saw the Taoiseach ‘blindsided’ by the news. Mr Fraser also said he didn’t make Mr Martin aware of the appointment before as he assumed he already knew of it.

‘Politically mischievous’