The Human Rights Commission has criticised the Government's moves to curtail the Freedom of Information Act, and said ministers should reconsider changing the system.
Set up under the Belfast Agreement to promote and protect human rights, the commission said it regretted that the Government failed to consult it before the proposals were published.
The existing Act was "one human rights area where the State had actually set an example of best practice for other countries", it said.
"There has been a considerable interest in Central and Eastern Europe and new democracies in the Irish legislation."
The Bill to amend the Act passed the committee stage in the Dáil yesterday, ahead of the report and the final stage debate next week.
It is expected to pass into law within weeks, preventing the release of confidential Cabinet records from 1998, whose five-year protection was to have lapsed this month under the existing Act.
The commission did not wish to enter the debate on the extension of that protection to 10 years, but said it had "continuing reservations" about other aspects of the Bill.
Despite repeated attempts by the Opposition and other campaigners to call on the Government to withdraw its plans, its only concession was the removal of a clause which would have restricted access to personal information.
Consultation with the Government was envisaged in the legislation establishing the commission, it said. The commission's president is former Fine Gael senator and TD, Dr Maurice Manning.
The 1997 Act was a "major achievement", it said.
"By enabling people to obtain information about the activities of the Government and other public bodies, it helped them to assert their rights in many other areas as well."
The commission said it was concerned about the widening of the definition of "government" to include committees of officials appointed by the Government for specific purposes. "This provision would widen the list of documents potentially excluded from access substantially and would make it mandatory to refuse access to them; instead of leaving it to the discretion of the head or minister concerned," it said.
While refusal was subject to an internal appeal within the body concerned and then an appeal to the Information Commissioner under the existing Act, the commission said it was concerned that the Government wanted to remove the right of appeal to the commissioner.
It said the amendment exempting all documents relating to tribunals of inquiry from disclosure "might be desirable" in relation to the matters under investigation, but it said issues of legal fees, staffing and administration should be open to public scrutiny.
On the exemption of records dealing with the costing by a public body of proposals made by a political party, the commission said there was "no good reason" why the costing of proposals "presumably at public expense" should be withheld.
