'Commissioner responsible for garda operations'

Mrs Owen told Anthony Barr BL, acting for the tribunal, that awarding promotions and handling intelligence were not the responsibility of a minister, but were internal matters for the force.

Mr Barr put it to the former minister that it seemed there was no designated Garda Intelligence Officer in the border regions of Donegal during the early 1990s, before the current ceasefires came into effect.

Retired Chief Superintendent Sean Ginty earlier told the tribunal he thought the Border Superintendent should gather intelligence, but Chief Superintendent Fitzpatrick, who was border Superintendent at the time, said he was told his primary role was to liaise with the RUC.

Chief Supt Fitzpatrick also said he received no training for his role as Border Supt.

Mr Barr said: “Each thought the other was acting as Intelligence Officer.”

However, Mrs Owen said she did not believe this was a matter for a Justice Minister.

“It wouldn’t be the role of the minister to be hands on finding out who was reporting to whom and who was giving what document to whom in what circumstances,” she said.

“I’m afraid I cannot expand any further than my own assumptions that I would have thought people could have briefed themselves and would have got some instructions.”

Mr Barr asked: “And whose responsibility was it to ensure that these things happened?”

“Ultimately the Commissioner for the Gardai was responsible for the

personnel under his charge. That’s where the bucks stops, and that’s all I can say,” she replied.

Mrs Owen, who served as Justice Minister in the Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left rainbow coalition Government between 1994 and 1997, said she had never had any reason to doubt the reliability of the gardai during her time in office.

“Like everyone else I’m listening and learning as this tribunal is emerging as to what went on but I would make the comment that when reports would be made to the Department of Justice about arms finds or bomb-making equipment finds, I would always have assumed that it was bona fide and that it had happened,” she said.

“There was never, during my time, ever any suspicions or question marks over any reports like this so I would always have worked on the basis that the information that was coming to the Department of Justice was fair and had happened.”

Mrs Owen said she had great trust in the Garda Siochana and said it was a matter of sadness and concern that evidence might emerge which would show officers acted improperly.

“I’m not naïve. Of course there will always be some people within every institution that will do wrong or not behave in a way that is honourable to the profession that they’re in,” she said.

“But I had great trust and I had great confidence in the Garda Siochana as a member of government and always supported them in whatever way I could.”

The former Fine Gael TD said she had always presumed the information she was given was the best and most honest available.

“I might have now and again wished I’d had slightly more information about some issues but I never felt that it was being held back from me in any kind of conspiratorial way,” she said.

“But generally speaking I was well briefed.”