My colleague John McGuirk has argued that the Minister who leaked the details of the Zappone appointment provided a service to the country, even though, as he accepts, that was clearly not the primary concern of the leaker.
That’s not the position I take, nor is the position I think either the Government or the Gardai should take. The Fine Gael Minister who leaked the material should be named, they should be sacked from Cabinet, and, ideally, they should be prosecuted.
I’m happy to admit that it’s probably going to be seen as rather odd for a journalist to take that line, and I’m sure the usual suspects will be taken as proof that I’m just here to support the Government or whatever vested interest I’m assumed to be aligned with.
The truth of the matter is that I simply believe that Ministers should not, in the general course of things, deliberately violate provisions of the Irish constitution and should, if they do, be lined up and shot. Depending on the provision of the Constitution they break that firing squad should be either a literal or metaphorical one.
The Minister who is responsible for this leak has a) undermined the ability of the Government to govern, b) breached their constitutional responsibilities in doing so, and c) done so purely in order to advance their own career and without any consideration for the public interest, the consequences of what they were doing on our democratic norms, or even just the impact their leaks are having on their own party.
John’s argument is a reasonable one but on a practical level I don’t think it really stands up. The leak didn’t reveal anything of public interest that wouldn’t have shortly become known anyway – the appointment would have been publicly reported and would have, when journalists asked even basic questions about how Zappone was selected, fallen apart.
What the leak has done is a) breach Cabinet confidentiality, and b) directly undermine collective responsibility.
The two points there, on Cabinet confidentiality and collective responsibility, haven’t been getting a lot of attention. They should be, both are core components of our system of governance, and both are constitutionally protected.
Collective responsibility means that all cabinet ministers are bound by the decisions made at cabinet and must, regardless of their own private misgivings, publicly uphold the positions taken by the cabinet. Basically, you can say anything you want about policies at cabinet meetings, and you can really let loose safe in the knowledge you’re protected by Cabinet confidentiality, but afterwards all Ministers must speak as one.
Together they allow the Cabinet to present a strong, united front whilst giving Ministers the ability to internally have the sort of frank discussions on the benefits and costs of Government policies that they need to have.
The leaker didn’t just leak a newly decided policy position from Cabinet, they made public the actions and statements of individual members of the Cabinet. By doing so they have directly attacked both Cabinet confidentially, collective responsibility, and so the ability of the Cabinet to have the sort of frank, private discussions which are the Cabinet needs to be able to have.
To undermine those, in the name of personal ambition, is not in any shape or form to support the public interest. It’s to attack a norm which improves the standard of governance, and which is a key component of our political system.
Read an alternative view here