The Labour leader said yesterday that he has no doubts about the Taoiseach's probity.
Asked if he had had any doubts about Mr Ahern's integrity when he served in government with him, Mr Ruairi Quinn said: "None whatsoever." Asked if he had any doubts now, Mr Quinn replied: "I have no reason, and I don't have any reason . . . and I don't have any doubts about Bertie's probity whatsoever."
In an interview on the RTE Radio programme This Week, Mr Quinn denied that the Opposition was engaging in "guilt by association" in its attacks on Fianna Fail.
"The reality is that people like Mary O'Rourke, Bertie Ahern and others were in a cabinet which was presided over by Charles Haughey. Mr Ahern is quoted as having said at the parliamentary party meeting last Wednesday that some ministers were `forced' to do things that they did not particularly like. One such example could have been the Carysfort purchase which Mary O'Rourke, as minister for education, had to do. So there are a lot of questions associated with that era", he said.
Mr Quinn said that the revelations about Mr Haughey's lifestyle, the donation received by Mr Ray Burke and the extraordinary performance by Mr Padraig Flynn on the Late Late Show had all come about around the same time.
"They have shocked the nation, and I think they have shocked an awful lot of people covering these stories in the journalistic world. All that the Opposition has been doing has been to raise the questions which have been legitimately raised in the media."
Mr Quinn said that Mr Pat Rabbitte's reference to "taking out" Ms Beverly Cooper-Flynn was unfortunate. "Pat regretted making it, and I regret that it was made. It seemed to personalise politics in a way that I certainly don't like at all."
Mr Quinn said that he had not come into politics to engage in personal mud-slinging and abuse.
