Shane Phelan: Ruling has implications for future investigations

The court’s ruling now paves the way for Mr Shatter to seek the deletion of the parts of the report that were critical of him

Former Justice Minister Alan Shatter has been considerably vindicated following the ruling of the Court of Appeal that his right to fair procedure was breached by barrister Sean Guerin.

Although a commission of investigation later absolved him of Mr Guerin's finding that he failed to heed complaints from garda whistleblower Maurice McCabe, the senior counsel's 2014 scoping report has remained on the public record.

The court's ruling now paves the way for Mr Shatter to seek the deletion of the parts of the report that were critical of him.

The ruling came too late to save Mr Shatter's political career. He lost his ministry and his Dáil seat after the report's publication.

But the court's findings may allow him to mount a comeback.

The court observed Taoiseach Enda Kenny had, in effect, required Mr Shatter's resignation because of the ultimately unfounded criticism in the report.

It said Mr Shatter resigned unnecessarily in the sense that there was no good reason for him to do so. Had he been given an opportunity to respond to Mr Guerin's findings before the report was published, things may have been very different.

While Mr Shatter welcomed the findings and can take comfort from them, the same cannot be said for Mr Kenny, who looks to have rushed to judgment when he left his Fine Gael colleague with little option but to resign.

It is notable that Mr Kenny declined to say last night whether Mr Shatter deserved an apology.

As well as putting the spotlight on Mr Kenny's judgment, the court's ruling also has implications for the way inquiries requested by the Government are conducted in future. It has become commonplace for scoping exercises to be ordered as a precursor to full-blown commissions of investigation.

Mr Guerin believed he was only giving a narrative description and expressing opinions on what was in the documents he examined, rather than making findings of fact. But the court found that his report did amount to critical findings against Mr Shatter.

It means that in future such scoping exercises will have to be careful not to stray into overt criticism of individuals, or if they do, will have to seek the other side of the story.

The ruling also raises questions over the deadlines imposed in such exercises.

The court said that, although Mr Guerin had made an error, it could not criticise him. He was under considerable pressure to examine a huge amount of documentation within a very short time frame.

Irish Independent