THE ENTIRE activities of the Garda Síochána should not be precluded from Freedom of Information inquiries, according to a member of the Garda Ombudsman Commission.
Conor Brady was speaking at the University of Limerick yesterday where he was one of a number of guest speakers at a conference entitled Democracy and the Right to Know - 10 years after the introduction of the Freedom of Information (FoI) Act.
Ireland is one of the few western countries not to include its police force in transparency legislation.
When asked if the Garda Síochána should be covered by the FoI Act, Mr Brady, the former editor of The Irish Times, said administrative matters in any institution should be included but warned that transparency was not possible in all areas of Garda work.
"I see no reasons why administrative matters in any institution shouldn't be covered by freedom of information . . . But as for operational matters and matters relating to prosecutions or criminal investigations, there is a real problem there and I think transparency is rarely possible in those situations," he said.
Also at the conference was Fine Gael justice spokesman Charlie Flanagan, who said it was unfair that the Garda was a "no-go" area in terms of the Freedom of Information Act.
"I think its unfair just to throw a blanket over the Garda Síochána and say that's a no-go area," Mr Flanagan said. He also called for areas such as Garda management structures and decision-making regarding regionalisation of the force to be included under the Freedom of Information Act.
Mr Brady also said that the Department of Justice would soon introduce amendments to the Garda Síochána Act 2005.
"There are a number of aspects of the current legislation . . . which we believe require amendment in order to enable us to do our work more efficiently and to enable us to deal more effectively with a lot of what you might call more trivial complaints," he said.
"We have had discussions with the department. . . and we understand that legislation will be forthcoming and we're pleased about that."