AN INFORMED CITIZENRY often derives its knowledge from government agencies so when the Irish Department of Health refuses to answer questions posed by elected representatives, you have to wonder why. More than two-thirds of Dail questions to the Irish health minister are passed on to the Health Services Executive, which then fails to answer 95% of them, according to Martin Frawley in the Sunday Tribune.
This lack of accountability has become institutionalised in Ireland. The Minister for Health, Mary Harney, uses the Health Services Executive as a shitscreen. You cannot get hit with shit when you have a reinforced shitscreen wrapped around your office.
For Irish taxpayers, there is solace in knowing that if you cannot get free information proscribed by law, you're probably not going to know what else you're missing.
Martin Frawley -- "Tell them nothing: Department of Health compared to Politburo in Fobbing Off Parliamentary Questions" in the Sunday Tribune, 14 January 2007.