Varadkar: The Tánaiste was aware of Garda campaign to smear McCabe
FRANCES Fitzgerald was aware of the Garda campaign against Sergeant Maurice McCabe when she was Justice Minister, the Taoiseach admitted yesterday.
Speaking to Marian Finucane on RTÉ Radio 1, Leo Varadkar confirmed the emails that came to light last month showed ‘that there was some level of awareness, but not any detail’ by the former tánaiste about the smear campaign against the Garda whistleblower.
The Disclosures Tribunal was established to inquire into, among other things, whether there had been a campaign against Sgt McCabe waged by Garda management, and what level of knowledge there was within Government.
Before and after she resigned on Tuesday, Ms Fitzgerald maintained that ‘she did not recall the emails’ – and yesterday the Taoiseach maintained that he regretted the resignation, and believed his former minister would be vindicated in the Charleton Tribunal.
Asked whether Ms Fitzgerald took a political view on the emails, the Taoiseach said that she would have heeded the advice that it was not a matter for her to get involved in, especially when advice to that effect came from the attorney general.
Despite her resignation, which stopped a general election, the Taoiseach continues to believe Ms Fitzgerald did nothing wrong and that the Charleton Tribunal will vindicate Mrs Fitzgerald after it hears all the evidence.
He said: ‘I don’t necessarily think that [her resignation to halt a crisis] is the right thing, it’s still my view that Frances acted properly in terms of her obligations and I would have preferred this to have been dealt with at the tribunal, it would have been fairer.’
It was only on Monday, November 27, that the Taoiseach received all the relevant documents, he argued – although a preliminary report was available two days beforehand. That report did include the key second email that sealed Ms Fitzgerald’s political fate.
Challenged on the fact that Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin would have been in the dark about the extent of the scandal as the two party leaders negotiated to stave off a general election, the Taoiseach said Mr Martin was given ‘the stuff we had as we went along’.
Knowing that he had provided the Dáil with misleading information on three occasions, as outlined by the Irish Mail on Sunday last week, had been an ‘extremely unpleasant’ experience, said the Taoiseach.
The document trawl by the Department of Justice had been ordered to put all the information into context, explained the Taoiseach, he said: ‘I was certain I didn’t want any more of [what] was a dripdrip-drip of information coming out.’
Refusing to indicate whether he thought there was collusion between the Department of Justice and An Garda Síochána, the Taoiseach said: ‘That’s why we have a tribunal, and this is one of the reasons why I would prefer that we’d allowed these matters to be decided at the Charleton Tribunal.’
He said there would not be a ‘witch hunt’ into why legal requirements to hand over the emails at the centre of the scandals were not met.
Mr Varadkar said a barrister has been appointed to investigate why the documents only emerged into the public domain via leaks.
Mr Varadkar was also questioned about his handling of the growing political crisis as his administration edged closer to a general election last weekend. He credited British spin doctor Alastair Campbell with a lesson in realpolitik. ‘There’s a rule in politics, or there’s a rule created by Alastair Campbell, if a minister is the centre of a controversy for more than 11 days, it just has to be ended. That’s quite a cruel approach, I think, but we got into that space, there was a feeding frenzy that was going on for so long that people were coming to the view that this needed to be ended.’
He also played down suggestions that Fine Gael’s confidence and supply agreement with Fianna Fáil had been compromised by recent events. ‘My intention is to bring in another budget, because the deal we have with Fianna Fáil, the confidence and supply agreement, is a three-year deal,’ he told Ms Finucane. ‘There is absolutely no doubt that if Fianna Fáil wants to cause an election they can do that.’
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