I want to return to the matter of Garda conduct in Donegal and the Carty report which was completed and submitted in July 2000. This was a report by a senior policeman into the awful, appalling, unbelievable and bizarre allegations surrounding the conduct and performance of the Garda in Donegal.

In November 2001, the Government voted down a joint motion in the name of my Labour Party colleague, Deputy Howlin, and former Deputy Jim Higgins of Fine Gael seeking an inquiry into what was going on in Donegal. Last Friday, we learned from the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy McDowell, that the Taoiseach did not have the Carty report. He said the then Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, and he, as Attorney General, did not get the report until January or February 2002. This is the same man who tried to say that Nora Owen and the rainbow coalition were responsible for what happened in Donegal. He now says he and the then Minister did not get the report until the beginning of 2002.

In February 2001, when Deputy Howlin tabled a question expressly on the Carty report and its findings and what he intended to do with it, the Minister, Deputy O'Donoghue, led him to believe that he had received the Carty report and that, by extension, it did not bear out the character of allegations being made about Garda activities in Donegal. The import of the then Minister's statement meant he not only misled the House but that he communicated, as a result of giving the impression he had the Carty report and was taking no action, that the allegations were baseless or exaggerated. Will the Taoiseach defend the actions of the then Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform?

Will it be a policy of zero tolerance?

Will the Taoiseach say the Minister similarly misled him and the Cabinet at the time, that he had the Carty report in his possession and that it did not bear out the grave character of allegations of abuse and dereliction of duty of the Garda in Donegal?

I do not know when the Minister, Deputy O'Donoghue, got the report.

The Minister, Deputy McDowell, gave us that information on Friday.

I did not read the contents of the report——

There is no way one could read everything the Minister says but he told us on Friday——

The Taoiseach should be allowed to continue without interruption.

I will not rehearse the details of last week's debate. I will answer questions with regard to when the Minister got the report and who acted on the report but I will not attempt, off the top of my head, to discuss the details of when the report was passed over. It is impossible for me to do so.

No answers, that never happened before.

It is a first that the Taoiseach can think of no defence.

I am not going to try to answer.

Either the Minister, Deputy McDowell, is telling this House an untruth or the Minister, Deputy O'Donoghue, told this House an untruth regarding a grave matter which goes to the cornerstone of our democracy. I ask the Taoiseach as head of the Government to answer the question. I put it to him that both Ministers are now being untruthful, that the Government possessed the Carty report and that the Government is doing what Deputy Martin when Minister for Education and Science did by dumping on the senior Garda authorities because it needed to provide a fig leaf as to why it resisted an inquiry into Donegal. It had the report, minus the appendices, all along. The appendices comprised the witness statements but the substantial conclusions of the inspector which were submitted to the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform bore out the gravity of the allegations with regard to Donegal. As Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue sat on it and covered up and used it in this House as and when it suited him. The Government voted down the request from this side of the House for a joint motion on an investigation into the events in Donegal.

The current Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform has the cheek to allege inside and outside this House and on radio that, somehow, those whose knees were under the Cabinet table of the rainbow Government were responsible. He gets away with this in some sections of the media. It is almost beyond belief that the man who says he did not receive the report until 2002 can say his predecessor in office from 1994 to 1997 was responsible. It is disgraceful. If former Minister for Justice, Ms Nora Owen, was implicated in this manner and the Taoiseach and his colleagues were on this side of the House they would hound her to resign. It is a disgraceful dereliction of duty. The Government did not anticipate that Mr. Justice Morris would get to the bottom of the matter.

As I said, I am not going to get into the issue. If they did not do so last week, both Ministers are capable of answering the question of when they had the report. I am not going to speculate on that. Deputy Rabbitte knows——

The Taoiseach could ask them.

Two versions of it were on the record.

Allow the Taoiseach without interruption.

——that for several years, complaints were heard in the Department of Justice about events in Donegal.

It did not have an official report from the Garda.

The Government still voted against it.

Several complaints were made over the period. The Ministers have given chapter and verse. I will not discuss when it began. Deputy Rabbitte is aware that it continued for a long time. The 160 complaints which are now the subject of litigation and the Morris tribunal did not commence on a particular date, as the Deputy would like to put on the record. The point, however, is that this Government established the Morris tribunal.

As well as the Flood tribunal.

The Taoiseach should not be talking rubbish.

The Opposition, while in Government, had an opportunity to establish whatever tribunal it wanted. It did not do so. Deputy Rabbitte is aware of this. Allegations and complaints were made.

The sworn evidence of Secretaries General is being contradicted.

I remind Deputy Howlin that his leader is entitled to hear an answer to his question without interruption.

Deputy Howlin has an interest in this matter because he has been involved in it all the way. He can use another occasion to make his speech. The fact is——

The people of Donegal have suffered enough.

——that this Government established the Morris tribunal and has done everything to unearth and act upon all the difficulties in the Garda Síochána in Donegal.

The Government did nothing.

The Taoiseach without interruption.

One cannot move away from that. Questions may be asked in terms of files or dates but this Government has acted on the issue and made the credible and necessary decisions.

It certainly did not take on board any of the recommendations.

The Government is legislating, based on both Morris reports, to ensure these events are not repeated. That is a fact.