I was wondering if the Minister, Deputy Quinn, had said anything positive about former Minister, Deputy Shatter. While in this regard there was not much information around the old Twitter machine tells me that in the past hour the Minister, Deputy Quinn, said that former Minister, Deputy Shatter, was a reforming Minister, whose record will stand for many years to come. How true.

"I'll tell you something Maurice, and this is just personal advice to you, if Shatter thinks you're screwing him, you're finished."

"If Shatter thinks, here's this guy again trying another route trying to put pressure, he'll go after you."

"He'll go after you."

Fortunately, Deputy Shatter has resigned as Minister. However, the comments of the Minister, Deputy Quinn, suggest that he thinks he was great and right to do what he did.

At this time, Garda Nicky Keogh - that is his name and he is proud of it - from Athlone Garda Station is presenting information to the confidential recipient, Mr. Justice Patrick McMahon. Given the gaping hole that there is in legislation in this country, which means the avenue of the Ombudsman commission is cut off, he has no option but to go to the confidential recipient. He has been left with no choice but to go public because since last week when the man voted by this Government to be Taoiseach laughed at what he brought to me the word at his local Garda station is that he is a whistleblower or, to use a word being used by many people, a snitch. His allegations are serious, including a cover up of an original file which was stolen, with the original incident being removed from the PULSE system; the creation of new statements and appearance of new original information; non-compliance by the Garda with the court order for disclosure and at least one of the accused being threatened by a garda to plead guilty on the day of the court case.

His greatest concern with the drugs operation in November 2009 is that there was a systematic and orchestrated effort by high-ranking Garda officers to induce and coerce citizens, in this case citizens with no previous criminal conviction, to buy drugs from drug dealers, putting them in personal danger, and sell the drugs in turn to undercover gardaí without making any profit, thus boosting crime detection figures concerning arrests, charges and convictions. The result of this operation was that these mostly young citizens of the State, who had no previous drug convictions, now have serious drug convictions.

Finally, a further aspect of grave concern regarding the planning of this operation was that the list of persons nominated to be targeted had a notable omission in that a significant and well recognised drug dealer in the area who has long been associated with a senior member of the drugs unit was excluded. My question is simple enough: what will the Government do to reassure the whistleblower that he will not be bullied or have a rat hung on his door? Will the Government encourage members of the public to go to Athlone Garda station this evening? When the man in question goes to work, he should be encouraged and it should be made known to him that he is a hero and not a rat, as the Government seems to suggest such people are.

The Patten report, which was published many years ago, had approximately 266 recommendations. Approximately 16 of them referred specifically to the nature of the divided society in Northern Ireland and were particular to that part of United kingdom and all the divisions with which we are familiar. The remaining 250 were the best types of recommendations one could possibly have for a Garda authority in this State. My colleague Deputy Brendan Howlin, now Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, brought forward a Bill to that effect. It was rejected by the then Fianna Fáil coalition Government.

If we had the desired authority — we will have it — many of the issues raised by the Deputy, whose concerns I share, could be addressed through a proper outlet. We would have a proper ombudsman for the Garda Síochána, a proper authority and a proper complaints procedure. The Labour Party and Government are committed to introducing a Garda authority. We are committed to introducing whistleblower legislation. These have been on the Statute Book in a partial way. Before the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, Deputy Pat Rabbitte, became the leader of the Labour Party, he published whistleblower legislation. It was accepted on Committee Stage but then it disappeared into the bowels of the then Government.

The concerns the Deputy is expressing about the individual in question, whom I do not know, are concerns we all share, and I thank the Deputy for raising them. When we have finished our work — we will move without delay — we will have established a Garda authority that will build on the practice that has now emerged in Northern Ireland and elsewhere. Northern Ireland is a good place to start, and the Patten report is a document on which we can build our own foundations. This, plus legislation that will protect whistleblowers and other kinds of safeguards, will result in what Deputy Daly called a Garda police service, not a police force and all that this implies. I thank Deputy Flanagan for the way in which he articulated his point. I have outlined where we want to go and we will go there. When we debate the published report, rather than speculate on its content, we will move to have the aforementioned provisions put in place so the kinds of events the Deputy is describing today will no longer happen.

The Government has been in power for three years but urgency and three years do not really go together. If the former Minister had been a reforming Minister, he would have taken on board Deputy Wallace's policing Bill last July. The reality, however, is that the Government is not taking it seriously. There have been circumstances in this country requiring the introduction of legislation overnight. Examples include the legislation to close headshops because of the Government's concerns over drug use. There are now circumstances where heroin dealing and the Garda Síochána are being connected. Can we have overnight legislation on this? An amendment to the Garda Act 2005 would allow serving members of An Garda Síochána to make a complaint to GSOC. It is suggested that in section 82 of the 2005 Act, " "member of the public" means a person other than the Garda Commissioner and includes serving and former members of An Garda Síochána" be substituted for " "member of the public" means a person other than a member of the Garda Síochána or the Garda Commissioner". This is because the individual in question is taking a grave risk today. He is bringing the information to someone for whom I have no disrespect as she is doing the job she has to do but the information will be brought to the acting Garda Commissioner. That is not ideal. We need to be reassured that we will not have what happened last week, in other words, tittle tattle coming down the line, including in the form of the Garda car that followed the former member of the Garda and the current member. I know the Taoiseach wanted to make a joke out of it and say the gardaí were following me. We need to be assured that when the information goes to the acting Garda Commissioner, it will not filter down the line and scupper what the people to whom I refer are trying to achieve. Nicky Keogh is a hero. I wish I knew more heroes like him. There are plenty of them in the Garda Síochána. He has done them proud today and I hope they will shake his hand rather than tie a knot in a rat's tail and put it on his door.

Every Deputy in this House would share the concerns the Deputy has expressed. Let us work together to put in place, on the basis of everything that has happened in recent months and years, dating back to previous Dála, the kind of police or Garda authority that the country requires in the second decade of the 21st century, and protection for whistleblowers, wherever they work in the public service, not just in the Garda. That is what this society needs and what the Government is going to achieve, in the next two years.