The on­go­ing ex­change be­tween the AG, the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion Chair­man and its reg­is­trar shows the se­ri­ous chal­lenges fac­ing our pub­lic in­sti­tu­tions in re­spect of prin­ci­ples and ef­fec­tive­ness.Michael Williams makes the point that S38 of the IPLA on­ly re­quires the com­mis­sion to get the sub­ject's views be­fore com­plet­ing its re­port in­to al­le­ga­tions. We are now see­ing this Range Rover is­sue con­flat­ed by the me­dia with the res­ig­na­tion of the 2009 Com­mis­sion and the res­ig­na­tion of Dr St Cyr.

The nat­ur­al jus­tice prin­ci­ple is be­ing test­ed to de­struc­tion in this rounds, the con­tention be­ing that an ac­cused per­son needs to be no­ti­fied at the start of an in­ves­ti­ga­tion.One can scarce­ly imag­ine that lofty prin­ci­ple be­ing ex­tend­ed to those ac­cused of rape, mur­der or rob­bery. Ut­ter non­sense is be­ing pre­sent­ed to fur­ther un­der­mine this im­por­tant pub­lic in­sti­tu­tion. The peo­ple to be in­ves­ti­gat­ed by the com­mis­sion are pow­er­ful of­fi­cials ac­cused of cor­rup­tion, so no pri­or no­tice is nec­es­sary.

Worse yet, we have the com­mis­sion's reg­is­trar apol­o­gis­ing for not no­ti­fy­ing the AG of said in­ves­ti­ga­tion, with the AG us­ing that apol­o­gy to de­mand the res­ig­na­tion of the com­mis­sion's chair­man. The Op­po­si­tion Leader is re­port­ed to be back­ing the com­mis­sion in this mat­ter.

Bla­tant dou­ble stan­dards in re­la­tion to white-col­lar crime are no new thing: just re­mem­ber that one of the May 2009 pro­pos­als by then AG Brigid An­nisette-George was to amend the IPLA by re­quir­ing com­plainants to give their names, ad­dress­es and a signed state­ment. That move was even­tu­al­ly with­drawn af­ter be­ing heav­i­ly con­demned by the UNC (in op­po­si­tion) and the wider pub­lic.

What con­cerns me is that the com­mis­sion's reg­is­trar seems to ac­cept that no­ti­fy­ing ac­cused peo­ple at the start of an in­ves­ti­ga­tion is prop­er prac­tice. If that is re­al­ly the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion's ap­proach to these se­ri­ous mat­ters, then it is no won­der that their im­pact on pub­lic sec­tor cor­rup­tion has been so very lim­it­ed.This in­ten­tion­al cul­ti­va­tion of con­fu­sion is part of a long-term se­ries of moves to di­lute the ef­fec­tive­ness of the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion.

No res­ig­na­tions are called for since the main shift needs to be to­wards a learn­ing cul­ture. We have to recog­nise in­ef­fec­tive ap­proach­es and make the nec­es­sary changes, if we are to have any chance of deal­ing with white-col­lar crime.The In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion needs to rise to this chal­lenge. The Law As­so­ci­a­tion needs to clar­i­fy how the nat­ur­al jus­tice prin­ci­ple ap­plies in the in­ves­ti­ga­tion stage.

Afra Ray­mond

PoS