What can the Government do about the wave of disinformation flooding our democracies? Here’s a radical idea: it can start telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And stop playing cynical games with public information.

The difference between an authoritarian regime and a democracy is the difference between compliance and informed consent. Increasingly, with this Government, that line is being dangerously blurred.

Consider two recent examples:

The first touches on both Ireland’s moral obligations and its international standing. As citizens we need to know whether the Aughinish Alumina plant in Co Limerick is in effect part of Vladimir Putin’s war machine.

Galway company that owes Revenue €106m has just €17,500 in cash

Car involved in M50 crash that left nine in hospital was stolen before incident

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A ‘bananas’ order for 5,000 obscure titles from a bookshop in Galway fuels suspicion

On foot of reporting last March by The Irish Times, in co-operation with the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, the Government commissioned an investigation into the export of alumina to Russia and whether it is then turned into aluminium used in the manufacture of weaponry.

On July 24th, instead of publishing the report of this investigation, the Minister for Enterprise and Employment Peter Burke merely issued a short statement telling us that “no adverse findings have been determined in relation to the export of alumina to Russia by the company” and that “no evidence corroborating the media assertions could be found”. He said that “my department has made every effort to........

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