Telecom-leak messenger sacked

Michael Ryan - the messenger responsible for the Telecom leak - has been sacked, it was confirmed this afternoon.

Maarten Wevers, chief executive of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (DPMC) where Mr Ryan worked, said a response from the messenger's lawyer had been considered before the sacking was carried out.

A police spokesman also confirmed a complaint had been lodged over the leak and officers would be investigating.

Mr Wevers today stood by the security checks made on Mr Ryan, who has spent years in the public service and joined the department last October.

Mr Wevers today said chief executives had to approve employees' access to sensitive and confidential information. This had been done on the basis of the checks on Mr Ryan.

An additional check was initiated about Mr Ryan, a Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) check to make sure there was "nothing untoward" in the man's background.

This was only done for department staff acting in certain roles, Mr Wevers said.

The four messengers working in the department were cleared to see sensitive documents, which was the "appropriate" clearance.

"The report from the State Services Commission [published yesterday] makes clear that he did have the appropriate clearances to see the documents that are circulating within the Cabinet system," Mr Wevers told National Radio.

The SIS check related to handling of "highly classified information" which Mr Ryan would carry but never see.

That information would have been put in a secure envelope, registered on dispatch and receipt, and "he would simply be the person to carry it from one location to the other".

Mr Wevers and Cabinet secretary Diane Morcom offered their resignations yesterday over the leak but Prime Minister Helen Clark refused to accept them, saying they should not take the fall for the actions of a low-level messenger acting dishonestly.

The State Services Commission (SSC) report into the leak said that on six separate occasions Mr Ryan had been briefed and shown codes of conduct on how to behave.

Mr Wevers said Mr Ryan was suspended without pay last week, pending the department's own investigation and Mr Ryan was warned it could end in his dismissal. It sent Mr Ryan a further letter yesterday, saying the evidence against him "seemed compelling".

Mr Ryan responded shortly after 5pm. Mr Wevers said today that this had been considered and he had now been sacked.

DPMC is separate to the Prime Minister's own office.

It is a department of around 130 staff. It includes the Cabinet Office, support services for the governor-general and Government House, and offers policy advice.

Mr Wevers said that State Services Commissioner Mark Prebble, who headed the DPMC before taking the top job at the commission, had told him he would be held to account for the performance of the department and its employees.

Mr Ryan is understood to be staying with his mother-in-law at a Wellington address. His lawyer, Peter Cullen, was due to hold a press conference this afternoon.

It was revealed today that Mr Ryan is the son-in-law of one of New Zealand's most illustrious civil servants, the late former Chief Ombudsman Sir John Robertson.

Sir John, who was also former Secretary of Defence and Secretary of Justice, died in 2001, aged 76, after nearly 60 years as a civil servant.

- NZPA