Thanks to the DIRT report, a bad couple of years for politicians is ending on a high and they are entering the new millennium with increased self-esteem and hope. On the other hand, lawyers and financial institutions, who have had a wonderful decade commercially, have suffered a further blow to their public standing.
The Government is so pleased with the speedy and succinct reporting of Jim Mitchell's Public Accounts sub Committee that it is considering what other matters of public interest can be referred to Oireachtas committees. Indeed, any investigation which does not involve politicians is now likely to be taken away from the judges and given to the politicians because of their record for speed, precision, economy, openness and singlemindedness. The inquiry into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings will probably be the next subject for an Oireachtas committee. Matters to do with health and children are other obvious areas where politicians can replace lawyers. And while the politicians aren't paid extra for the huge amount of additional work involved they are unlikely to reject it in view of the useful crime-busting profile it creates.
Interestingly, neither of the two major tribunals currently at hearing - Flood on planning in Fingal and Moriarty on payments to politicians - would be suitable subjects for Oireachtas committees. Indeed when politicians, in the person of former finance ministers, appeared before the PAC, the members handed over the questioning to barristers. But lawyers are quick to point out that while the Mitchell report was indeed a model, the committee got the co-operation of the banks. Without that (at one stage AIB withdrew a threat to hold the whole procedure up because of a flaw in a summons), the lawyers would have had to have been called. Mitchell and his five-man team headed them off by demanding AIB appear before the PAC anyway and explain before the cameras exactly why they were obstructing the inquiry. Now, lawyers would have handled that hiccup differently, and we'd still be there.