Eamon Gilmore TD

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STATEMENT BY EAMON GILMORE TD - DEPT OF TRANSPORT REPORT NOT BELIEVABLE: INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATION NOW ESSENTIAL

Issued : Friday 26 October, 2007

The disclosure by the Department of Transport, that its Secretary General, Ms. Julie O'Neill, was also aware well in advance of the Aer Lingus announcement scrapping its Shannon-Heathrow air service now makes it more imperative than ever that we have the full independent inquiry sought by the Labour Party when this affair first broke.

We now have the bizarre situation where the Secretary and Assistant Secretary of the Department of Transport knew, the Secretary of the Taoiseach's own Department knew, yet nobody apparently bothered to mention this politically explosive development to either Mr. Ahern or Mr. Dempsey. It is simply not believable.

It was never likely that an internal Department of Transport inquiry, with civil servants investigating colleagues, would get to the end of this story.

When the news of the Department of Transport memo broke last Thursday, I called for the appointment of a respected figure from outside of the public service to inquire into this affair to establish who knew, what they knew and who they told. There is no now other way to establish the truth.