[Garda whistleblower John Wilson on TV3’s Tonight With Vincent Browne last week]
Mr Wilson is currently in Cavan General Hospital, after having emergency surgery for bowel cancer this week. He is currently awaiting results of a biopsy.
His wife, Anne Wilson, spoke to Pat Kenny this morning about her husband and about the stress he has been under for the last number of years in relation to his efforts to reveal what he believes has been wrongdoing by some members of the gardaí.
Pat Kenny: “You’re quoted in the papers as saying the stress of the whole thing brought on the bowel cancer, is that really your belief?”
Anne Wilson: “Well Pat, there’s no history in John’s family of it, or cancer. And the amount of stress is unbelievable, what that man has gone through over the last couple of years. There’s only one other person that can understand the amount of stress and that would be Maurice McCabe. It’s unbelievable what those two men had to go through. So I’m convinced it has contributed to because stress does cause..”
Kenny: “Stress indeed is one of the factors. If you have any kind of predisposition to it, the addition of stress on top of everything else can certainly bring it on and John undoubtedly went through an awful lot of stress. Has that stress been in anyway aliviated by Minister Varadkar and, overnight, Minister Joan Burton, offering their support?”
Wilson: “Well, actually, John was having a bad day yesterday in the hospital cause they lifted them out of the bed so he was in a bit of pain and when I heard about Minister Varadkar’s statement, I got in touch with John in the hospital and he was delighted so yes it has helped. I’m delighted that Mr Varadkar came out and spoke like that..it’s just it’s taken so long.”
Kenny: “Yes, and Joan Burton said that she was speaking really for all the Labour colleagues in cabinet – that they were of one view about all of this. So there’s no doubt that Sgt McCabe and your husband, John, have certainly have a good deal of support in Cabinet.”
Wilson: “Well I have to thank Clare Daly, Luke ‘Ming’ Flanagan, Mick Wallace, and Joan Collins – they were there from the beginning – and Padraig MacLochlainn and Mary Lou McDonald, they have been absolutely fantastic. From the very beginning, the Independents put their neck on the line and supported the Garda whistleblowers. And when the story came out first they could have sat back and just let it go, you know when we brought to their attention but they kept going and going and going. They were absolutely amazing, fighting for them.”
Kenny: “Yesterday, yet again, Commissioner Callinan refused to apologise for that ‘disgusting’ remark that he made back in January to the committee, what do you feel about that?”
Wilson: “I feel that Commissioner Callinan’s excuse now, or reason, for his ‘disgusting’ remark totally contradict the way he said it back in January. At the time in January, he didn’t mention it was the way the information was given to the public. He said it was disgusting and then he emphasised it by saying ‘personally, I think it’s disgusting’. So his comments now are totally contradicting, in my opinion, what he had said in the PAC.”
Listen back here
Meanwhile
Inevitable result of Varadkar and Joan Burton comments is not withdrawal of the words but resignation of commissioner. Time to go.
— Shane Ross (@Shane_RossTD) March 21, 2014
Previously: Gwan The Leo
Gilmore joins Varadkar’s call for Callinan to withdraw ‘disgusting’ comments (Irish Times)
