Ahern admits difficulties

The Taoiseach has suggested the Government may not be able to give the Dail's Committee on Public Accounts the extra powers it wants to inquire into bogus non-resident accounts in Allied Irish Banks.

The emerging difficulties will be discussed by lawyers representing the Attorney General's Office, the Comptroller and Auditor General and the committee today.

Mr Ahern told Opposition parties yesterday it may not be legally possible to marry a system whereby the CAG would have powers of investigation which would involve the committee "along the way".

Mr Ahern's response to Opposition questions in the Dail was the first signal that the Government is having some difficulty implementing the motion agreed by all parties in the Dail on October 21st.

In accordance with the interim report of the PAC on the AIB affair, the Dail agreed that the Comptroller and Auditor General, Mr John Purcell, would be given extra powers to conduct a fact-finding investigation into the administration of DIRT in AIB and other financial institutions and that the Compellability of Witnesses Act, 1997, would be amended to allow the PAC to inquire into his report and make recommendations.

The Taoiseach told the Dail "the proposal in the form I am receiving it is not the way I thought the committee was pursuing it".

Expressing his commitment to move the matter forward "if it is possible to do so", Mr Ahern explained that the PAC wished to confer certain crucial status on the C and AG and to feed in and out of the process itself. "I am not sure how that can be done".

The chairman of the PAC, Mr Jim Mitchell, was informed of the Government's legal difficulties at a meeting with the Chief Whip, Mr Seamus Brennan, last night.