Committee Reports > List of Committees > Dáil > 1953 > Committee on Procedure and Privileges > Report - Premature Disclosure of a Report of a Select Committee

REPORT

1. Pursuant to the Order of the Dáil of 6th May, 1953, the Committee on Procedure and Privileges have investigated the publication in a newspaper of a news item which gave a substantially accurate resumé of a report of a Select Committee of the Dáil which had not then been made available to Members of the House.

2. The news item under complaint was published in the Sunday Express of 3rd May, 1953, and was as follows:—

JUDGES TO GET RISE IN PAY

Eire’s 22 judges and 42 district justices are to get a rise in pay.

Under a plan now being considered by the Government the salaries of the five Supreme Court judges will jump from £3,450 to £3,700 and the Chief Justice’s from £4,600 to £4,850.

Six High Court judges will probably get an extra £250 a year, lifting their salaries to £3,250.

It is planned to give ten circuit court judges £2,575 each instead of the £2,125 they get now.

And the pay of district justices may be raised by £440, giving them incomes of £1,870 in Dublin and £1,740 in the country areas.

3. The Select Committee on Judicial Salaries, Expense Allowances and Pensions whose report was stated to have been prematurely disclosed was set up by Order of the Dáil on 9th December, 1952. The Select Committee, which sat in private, formally presented their report to the Dáil on 24th April, 1953, on which date an order was made by the House for the Report to lie upon the Table and for the Report and Proceedings to be printed. Owing to the interval of time required for the printing of the documents, the Report was not available to Members of the House until 8th May, 1953, on which date copies of it were laid on the Table. The publication of the news item in the Sunday Express on 3rd May, 1953, accordingly took place subsequent to the formal presentation of the Report but prior to a time when the presentation had any practical effect.

4. The questions which the Committee felt called upon to determine were whether the news item amounted to a disclosure of the terms of the Report of the Select Committee and, if so, whether the disclosure of the Report in advance of its availability to Members of the Dáil was a breach of the privileges of the House, and also what were the circumstances that led to the disclosure.

5. The Committee have compared the contents of the news item with the terms of the Report of the Select Committee and are satisfied that they are almost in complete agreement. Such small differences as were revealed cast no doubt on the essential accuracy of the information which in its nature could not be secured unless by someone who had access to or was informed of the terms of the Report.

6. The protection of its official documents is a power conferred on each House of the Oireachtas by Article 15.10 of the Constitution. A Committee appointed by the Dáil is bound by the rules of procedure to report back to the Dáil. It is open to such Committee to make an Order permitting representatives of the press to be present during their proceedings, but if no such Order is made it is presumed that the proceedings are private until a report is made to the House. It is clear that any Committee not admitting representatives of the press to hear their proceedings are entitled to have their privacy safe-guarded. If the contents of any of their proceedings are prematurely disclosed outside the House, an affront is offered to the House, and the House is entitled to take steps to punish all parties concerned in the disclosure.

7. The Committee accordingly find that the publication by the Sunday Express of the news item under complaint was a breach of the privileges of the Dáil as it constituted a premature disclosure of the Report of the Select Committee on Judicial Salaries, Expense Allowances and Pensions.

8. The Committee sought information as to the circumstances in which the disclosure of the terms of the Report of the Select Committee took place. The attention of the Oireachtas Press Gallery was drawn to the matter and the Committee of the Press Gallery at a special meeting expressed regret that there should have been a breach of the privileges of the Dáil, but stated that they were unable to ascertain the agency through which the breach was committed.

9. The Committee received a communication from the Editor of the Sunday Express, who had become aware of the Committee’s investigation, expressing his apologies for what he referred to as an “inadvertent breach.” In reply to a letter from the Committee the Editor repeated the apology and stated that in dealing with the news item there was no knowledge at the time among the editorial staff of the existence of the Select Committee. The newspaper authority, however, did not afford any details to the Committee which might have helped in identifying other parties linked up with the disclosure. The correspondence is printed as an Appendix to this Report.

10. The Committee then considered whether further steps should be taken with a view to the identification of other parties concerned in the disclosure. They decided that no useful purpose would be served in so doing. In this decision they were influenced by the fact that the incident was the first of its nature to come up for formal judgment and disapprobation and that it was possible that such other persons as were parties to the disclosure would claim not to have had full knowledge at the time of the implications of their act. The latter possibility is strengthened by the fact that the Report of the Select Committee had been presented formally to the Dáil at the time and was in the process of being printed for distribution. The Committee also had regard to the fact that the newspaper was outside the jurisdiction of Parliament and that it might prove difficult to bring further inquiries to a satisfactory conclusion.

11. The Committee recommend that since the apology of the Sunday Express was tendered as soon as the newspaper became aware of the effect of their action and was reaffirmed in a reply to the Committee’s communication, the apology be accepted. In coming to this decision the Committee wish to affirm clearly the principle that the proceedings of any Committee of the House which is not open to representatives of the press may not be disclosed by any person until the presentation of the report has taken place and has been made effective by its availability to Members. Any person who acts in disregard of the principle is guilty of a breach of the privileges of the House.

(Signed) PÁDRAIG Ó hÓGÁIN,

Chairman.

9th July, 1953.