Standards Commissioner George Hyzler has hit back at a fierce attack launched against him on Monday by Glen Bedingfield, denying the claims made by the Labour MP in a parliamentary adjournment speech. 

In a letter to the Speaker also published on the website of his office, Hyzler said that while his office did not allow him to get into exchanges with MPs, he felt he had to reply to allegations which, while being serious and unfounded, could have impacted on the credibility of his office. Attacks such as this only served to undermine parliament's efforts to strengthen the national institutions at a time when the country needed to show that its institutions were working.

Delving into the various points made by the Labour MP, the standards commissioner said his driver is on the same salary scale as the drivers of ministers and parliamentary secretaries although he is actually paid less than the others at €23,623 instead of €24,650.  The salary scale was included in the first financial plan for his office, approved by parliament.

On Monday Bedingfield had questioned how the driver was on pay scale nine, saying that is equivalent to junior doctors, teachers or auditors employed by the government.

Hyzler also denied a claim by Bedingfield that he was refusing to reply to parliamentary questions. He had already replied in detail to two questions made by Bedingfield himself, although he was aware that another two are pending, he said. Furthermore, Bedingfield was being incorrect and contradicting himself when he quoted from the reply to one of the questions - about the driver's salary - while claiming that questions were not being answered.

Glen Bedingfield.

As to questions raised by Bedingfield on the pay of consultants, the standards commissioner said he had three consultants who in total were paid €54,000 annually by his office, despite their qualifications and considerable experience. 

On his need to engage staff with urgency, Hyzler said that in one of his replies to Bedingfield's questions, he had explained that upon his appointment, he had needed to engage personnel urgently so that he could start to function. At the time he had no staff or office.

However, it was not true that five of the six employees of the office were persons of trust. Two of those six had already been public service employees and they were detailed to his office at his request, with approval by the Office of the Prime Minister.  Another employee was engaged after a public call.

As he had also explained in that reply, he had never said that persons of trust should not be engaged, Hyzler wrote. All ministers and parliamentary secretaries should be able to select persons of trust to form part of their secretariat. What he had said was that this old practice should be regulated by the constitution, with safeguards to ensure there was no abuse.

Hyzler also denied the claim by Bedingfield that a member of his staff was under a shadow of corruption or corrupt behaviour. His investigations had not turned up this unsubstantiated allegation, Hyzler said, but should the Labour MP have any evidence, he was being invited to hand it over privately.

He said Bedingfield was factually incorrect when he claimed that he had criticised government spending on advertising. What he had criticised was the use of public funds for political, personal, or partisan purposes.

Bedingield had at the same time criticised him for advertising a vacant post only on one newspaper and portal. But he had been prudent in his spending and chosen those outlets because they were enough to get national reach.

Hyzler said it was "absolutely not true" that documents had been leaked from his office. All the members of staff were sworn to confidentiality. That any report of an investigation was revealed had only happened after the reports were handed to the members of the parliamentary standards committee.  

Concluding, the standards commissioner said anyone who wanted to confirm his integrity as standards commissioner only needed to read the reports of the cases he had investigated.