MINISTER FOR Justice Dermot Ahern has rejected a Fine Gael demand to say when the Garda file on the Anglo Irish Bank investigation was going to be sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).
Mr Ahern said ministers for justice had “no role” in such matters and he described the call by Fine Gael finance spokesman Michael Noonan as “alarming”.
Mr Noonan had contrasted “the slow pace of progress in this investigation” with similar inquiries in the US, where almost 50 prosecutions had been secured.
“Not one person has been prosecuted yet in Ireland for their actions in helping to wreck our banking system,” Mr Noonan said after a Fine Gael frontbench meeting at Leinster House yesterday.
Mr Noonan said there was a “lack of political will within Government for progress to be made”. He called for an interim report from the Director of Corporate Enforcement.
He also called on Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan to “clear out the boards and the audit and credit committees of the banks covered by the guarantee scheme”.
Responding last night, Mr Ahern said: “As a former minister for justice, Deputy Noonan knows full well that ministers for justice have no role whatsoever in Garda investigations, prosecutions or the sending of files to the DPP.
“That is the norm in parliamentary democracies and it is alarming that Fine Gael are now suggesting that we depart from that.
“Any person guilty of fraud or financial misconduct will be brought to justice as soon as possible. But we cannot permit political interference in policing or the independent prosecution system,” the Minister said in a statement.
Mr Noonan stressed that his comments were directed at the Minister and not the Garda: “When I speak to the public, they just don’t think a lot is happening and that we had a banking crisis and there is very little accountability two years later.”
He pointed out that 70 per cent (33 out of 47) of the directors of the covered banks from 2007 were still in place.
“These are the same people that share responsibility for the decisions taken that led to a collapse in the sector.”
He added: “It is an increasing concern of mine that there simply isn’t a political will within this Fianna Fáil administration to see these types of issues brought to a head.
“Following discussions with my frontbench colleagues today, I am calling on the Ministers for Justice and Finance to bring some clarity to the foot dragging,” he said.
Mr Noonan added: “It is time for Brian Cowen and Brian Lenihan to break out of their ‘Hamlet’ phase of procrastination in relation to tackling the root cause of our banking and economic crisis.
“We cannot leave the same insiders in place and we cannot leave wrongdoing unpunished.
“We are two years on from the emergence of this crisis, more than long enough for these matters to have been dealt with,” Mr Noonan said.
Mr Ahern said: “This morning on radio Deputy Noonan admitted his party favoured a strategy of increased current spending cuts which would leave frontline policing and the prison service depleted.
“Deputy Noonan should leave An Garda Síochána and the DPP out of his increasingly desperate efforts to divert attention from this admission.”