Katherine Zappone Envoy Gig

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836585#Comment_117836585

Mary Lou opting to let FF devour itself some more over this. Let the Cowen's etc call for sackings.

Serious pressure on now, rarely has Morning Ireland covered a story so much in one programme.

jammiedodgers

https://twitter.com/gavreilly/status/1433315938712047621

👀...

CarProblem

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836612#Comment_117836612

Somebody needs to tell the media they're wasting their time devoting so much time to this "nothing burger" eh Labre34 🙄

FrancieBrady

Journalists now highlighting how much of a shambles the FOI system is.

Gavan Reilly on Twitter: "So even when you *specifically* ask for text messages between X and Y, a staff official will not ask for X’s phone, and will then tell you in writing that they did everything they could to find them" / Twitter

Floppybits

Well this who Zappone Envoy gig has really blown up now after weeks of shooing and hand waving saying there was nothing to see here. Was it Francie that said "No one hates a FG more than an a FG" or some such saying.

It has to be asked what was Coveney thinking with this Zappone appointment? Surely a capable minister such as him would what they need to do for a position like this. As for Varadkar, it seems anything that he is involved in just turns into an unmerciful mess. It is disappointing to see Coveney making such a mess of this because of all the politicians in FG he seemed to be the most capable one and didn't seem to be getting caught up in the Varadkar messes. For me there is no coming back from this for Coveney to go in and tell bare faced lies at the Oireactas meeting with this complete horsecrap of an excuse that he was hacked so he deleted the messages. I know they are trying to change the narrative now by saying "the government doesn't do business by text message" which is true except when they are looking to do something that they don't a record kept off.

gmisk

Glad to see piglet getting lots of publicity at least....it's a lovely spot

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836735#Comment_117836735

The quote I think is from a FGer or former FGer and goes

'if you think Fine Gael hate Sinn Fein, wait until you see how much they hate each other'

Floppybits

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836756#Comment_117836756

That's the one. At the moment nothing could be truer. Just listening to Pat Kenny and the reporter on now is saying that this story has been going for 5 weeks now and the story keeps changing.

seamus

@jammydodger wrote:

👀...

^^ This is exactly what I was thinking. Simon will be asked to stand aside to stop this issue from being a thorn when the Dail resumes. Internally in FG, I don't think this will put Coveney out of the race, but it'll silence any suggestions of a struggle until a new cabinet comes in.

@jmcc wrote:

This doesn't look good for Varadkar and Coveney:

This is very easily handwaved away. The FOI requests explicitly asks for Non-Personal Correspondence between Zappone and Varadkar about the event at the Merrion. It is very easily argued that the messages between Zappone and Varadkar about the event were entirely personal in nature and therefore outside the scope of the FOI request. Reading the texts, there is nothing formal or business-like within the messages. The fact that they may have been sent on his work phone is not relevant. Messages sent from your work phone are not automatically work messages, just like emails sent from your work email are not automatically work emails.

blanch152

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836804#Comment_117836804

Good points, and there is a crossover with GDPR, so, for example the questions about Matt are clearly within the realm of personal information. At best, the texts would have had to be released in redacted form.

I can't see any issue with the texts at all.

Dempo1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836612#Comment_117836612

Yes indeed 😁

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836804#Comment_117836804

Same question Sarah McInerney asked the hapless FGer on Drivetime...how is discussing the appointment of a UN envoy NOT government business?

The hapless FGer dithered and spluttered and eventually and embarrassingly admitted that, yes, it was government business.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836804#Comment_117836804

Theres no need for any hand waving away as regards text messages,either the civil servent is incompetent and didnt do their job or didnt have the info available

All parties involved,should land before forgien affairs committee to get bottom of it

seamus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836814#Comment_117836814

Lol, it turns out the reason is far less insidious. Leo was on holiday and they didn't think to ask to check his phone.

As Francie notes, it's a difficult problem FOI-wise. Data is no longer files just stored in filing cabinets or even on a single managed server. It's stored all over the shop, in apps and cloud backups and recorded phone calls.

It tells us that the Oireachtas I.T. services have a ways to go yet to properly get a handle on this. The reality is that TDs' official phones should be restricted to a certain set of apps, ones which are known to be secure and can have their data hoovered up and automatically logged and categorised.

This should then be backed up with legislation that creates an obligation on TDs to ensure any government-related business they conduct outside of the official IT systems (such as on a personal phone or email) is incidental and handed over as soon as possible. A failure to do so should be considered a serious breach by SIPO.

I wouldn't exactly blame a bunch of administrators and personal secretaries in a TD's office to not know about WhatsApp backups or not know how to effectively search databases of data. All of that sh1t should be transparent to them.

seamus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836850#Comment_117836850

To be fair, the requests were asking for correspondence specifically about the Merrion Event. They have no obligation to add correspondence about other matters.

Any road, it turns out that the staff didn't skip these messages, they actually didn't know they existed.

McMurphy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836814#Comment_117836814

**Listen.... Here it comes......**

The sound of squeaking as blanch wheels out the GDPR silver bullet security blanket. Leo has dropped himself in it so, seeing as it was him that released the text exchange. 🤔

And the text exchange between Leo and Simon most definitely involved discussing government work, there's no getting around that.

MrMusician18

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836735#Comment_117836735

Well there was nothing to see until varadkar decided to hang his colleague out to dry.

If FG wasn't full of extreme rivalry and faction fighting then this would be in the rear view mirror.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836948#Comment_117836948

Are you seriously suggesting that 'all practical, possible means of finding them' didn't include a phone call to Leo on holidays?

This is a straight up whitewash in a long running abuse of the intended FOI system.

Listen to people like Ken Foxe Ken Foxe (@kenfoxe) / Twitter or Simon McGarr Simon McGarr (@Tupp_Ed) / Twitter on trying to access stuff on our behalf, if you doubt me.

smurgen

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117836496#Comment_117836496

Didn't Leo put out a social media video prior to his leave saying he was not on holidays and would be working?

archfi

deleted

seamus

@McMurphy wrote:

And the text exchange between Leo and Simon most definitely involved discussing government work, there's no getting around that.

The FOI request(s) asked for messages between Zappone and Varadkar as far as I can see. Therefore the request will not capture messages between Varadkar and Coveney.

FOI is a difficult system to frame right to begin with. You don't want it to be so open that a request can be made to, "Give me a all correspondence to the Taoiseach's office between January 2000 and December 2021". But then if you have to be really prescriptive and exact, you make it easier to hide data by claiming that the request wasn't exact enough.

I don't know. Maybe there should be a dedicated FOI office that handles all of these requests rather than relying on a TD's staff to filter and request it.

BobHopeless

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837084#Comment_117837084

Don't worry they'll set up a committee to look into it and they'll report back in 3 years time.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837084#Comment_117837084

Horgan Jones FOI request specifically asked for communications between ministers. Got the same reply.

seamus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837137#Comment_117837137

Horgan Jones asked for correspondence between ministers in relation to the event at the Merrion. Not in relation to the Envoy position. Leo said, "Meeting Zappone on Wednesday".

Like I say, it's an issue with FOI. It's just a bit sh1t when it comes to informal comms.

McMurphy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837084#Comment_117837084

Would be hard to argue that the texts between Varadkar and Zappone weren't discussing government work also.

This one anyway, the other two (that I've seen) are just discussing the Merrion Céilí.

Dempo1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837154#Comment_117837154

Classic Leo, one word none discript response (Nope), Katherine must be looking at these images and cringing 😏

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837150#Comment_117837150

The texts show the two are interlinked seamus. There is no separating them.

Do you believe 'all practical and possible means' were taken to to find these texts?

seamus

@FrancieBrady wrote

The texts show the two are interlinked seamus. There is no separating them.

Well of course there is. They're texts in a different chat that make no reference to the Merrion. Even if these texts had been in a database, a search for "Zappone" would have brought it up, but the person who found it would have said, "No reference to the Merrion, therefore not relevant". I've been doing this kind of work long enough to know that there are human and technical limitations to finding the right information. Information science is a niche and technical area, and most people are really bad at it; they don't even know it exists.

Do you believe 'all practical and possible means' were taken to to find these texts?

Well, obviously not. But again, never ascribe to malice, that which is adequately explained by incompetence. The staff member who responded to the FOI request is conveniently "no longer working with the department".

It sounds to me like Varadkar got wind of the FOI requests, realised that these messages had been missed and decided it best that he get them out before anyone else did. I know the journalists are pissed off, but no real harm in the long run (except to the ongoing reputation of FOI requests).

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117837209#Comment_117837209

You will no doubt be pulling into the 'lessons have been learned, we need to move on' station shortly seamus.

As I said, read Ken Foxe and Simon McGarr's threads and you will come away, not suspecting, but knowing there are more sinister things going on with FOI.

seamus

I don't need to read the threads, I have no doubt that there are all sorts of shenanigans with FOI. I have no doubt that communications are manipulated before that stage even so they deliberately won't come up in FOI requests.

This one on the face of it though seems like an oversight. The actual texts make Varadkar look better, if anything, and the reason for them not being included is comical but utterly believable.

I'd be more skeptical if there was anything particularly damning in the texts, but there's not.