Omissions, Files, and “Teflon” Regulation

Omissions, Files, and “Teflon” Regulation

In May 2022, the Standards in Public Office Commission (SIPO) replied to my complaint about Simon Coveney. They admitted my case was complex, but told me that the issues I raised - non-response to correspondence, failure to intervene, and failure to provide data  - were outside their remit. They suggested I try the Ombudsman or the Data Protection Commission instead.

That response shows the problem: when omissions are treated as “not our remit,” accountability slides away.

Data and communications received seem to show the omissions were real and recorded:

📧 11 July 2018 – Simon Coveney received my plea for consular help, following the refusal of the Bern office since 2017, and forwarded it internally with just two words: “Not acknowledged.”

📑 in 2020 Garda National Protective Services Bureau – Detective Chief Superintendent Declan Daly confirmed that some of the data I was seeking wasn’t in Garda possession and directed me back to Swiss police.

📧 7 January 2021 –  former Bern DFA official Siobhan Kelly (who refused assistance in 2017) admitted she hadn’t even looked at my urgent emails, wasn’t sure if I was resident in Switzerland, and referred to a file in Bern that has never been made available to me. 

📑 Irish Prison Service (31 March 2022) – Formally acknowledged my data request under the Data Protection Act (Ref: SAR/035/2022) and promised release within 30 days. Those records were never provided.

 
Why this matters
Each of these shows omissions in black and white: emails not acknowledged, files withheld, records promised but never released. Yet SIPO said such omissions were not for them to investigate. Instead, I was passed to other bodies — a “teflon” system of regulation where responsibility never sticks.

 
The ask
This petition is about one thing: Irish authorities must release the data they hold. Omissions should not be a loophole that allows accountability to be avoided.

Moreover, who - linked to the #Ecolint cases - has records in Ireland, the UK and Switzerland?