The estimates for 2000, published in November, allocated £8 million towards the costs of the Moriarty tribunal. That's more than double the £3.4 million in bills already run up by the tribunal itself. The £8 million will pay the tribunal's own costs for 2000 and the legal costs of the parties which appeared before it. There may still be some costs outstanding in 2001, but the final figure for the tribunal should not stray hugely over the £12 million to £14 million mark. It is surely money well spent.
The tribunal has transformed our understanding of what this State was like in the 1980s and the role played during that time by Charles Haughey. It has even shed light on the 1970s, by reading into the public record of the files on Haughey accounts with Allied Irish Banks during that decade.
The tribunal has discovered little of interest in the financial affairs of Fine Gael's Michael Lowry but the evidence concerning Haughey has been truly amazing. The amount of money discovered by the tribunal as having been given to Haughey is difficult to quantify. The total amount being looked at, as revealed to date, is more than £5.5 million. This includes the £750,000 given to Haughey to clear his £1.143 AIB debt in December 1979, the month he was elected Taoiseach for the first time. The property developer Patrick Gallagher paid £300,000 but the source of the rest of it has not, as yet, been revealed.
Haughey had accounts in his own name in Guinness & Mahon bank and £1.5 million passed through them in the period 1979 to 1987. However some amounts may have travelled through more than one account.
Up to £300,000 was given to Haughey over the years by the hotelier, the late P.V. Doyle. Dr Edmund Farrell, former chief executive of the Irish Permanent, decided to donate £100,000 of the society's money in 1986. There was no election that year and no satisfactory reason for the donations has yet been heard. The cheques were made out to Fianna Fail but lodged to the party leader's account. Amounts were then withdrawn from the account and lodged to Haughey's Guinness & Mahon accounts. Another £40,000 donated in 1991 followed a similar route.
Donations totalling £2 million are now known to have been made by Ben Dunne/ Dunnes Stores, and not £1.3 million as had been believed after the McCracken hearings. Perhaps as significant is the knowledge that the Dunnes payments began in early and not late 1987 - within weeks of Haughey being elected Taoiseach after years in opposition.
It is known that almost £500,000 was given to Celtic Helicopters, the company run by Ciaran Haughey, in the years 1985 to 1992. The "investors" included two US businessmen who had contracts with public companies, Cruse Moss of General Automotive Corp, which made buses for CIE, and Guy Snowden of G-Tech, the company which has a contract with the National Lottery.
Money from Irish businessmen John Byrne, Seamus Purcell, P.V. Doyle, Joe Malone, Xavier McAuliffe, Pat Butler and Dr Michael Dargan also went into the company. Dargan, who had an account with Ansbacher (Cayman) at the time he was on the board of the Bank of Ireland, said he never authorised a donation to Celtic Helicopters.
Former health minister Dr John O'Connell gave £5,000 in 1985 after he was asked by Haughey to do so. Uniquely, he got a return on his investment, getting £15,000 from Haughey in 1992. Insurance broker Mike Murphy secured a £100,000 investment from Monaco-based insurance broker David Gresty.
No evidence has emerged of favours done in return for payments. However a very clear picture has emerged of a Taoiseach indebted to not only a number of the top business people in the State, but also to the State's largest bank. It puts a new light on the phenomenon of massive tax evasion by the rich during the 1980s, and the scandal of DIRT and AIB.
On a human level some of the most fascinating evidence to date has concerned the Fianna Fail party leader's account. More than £500,000 in excess of what came from the Exchequer, was lodged to the account in the period 1984 to 1992. At least £120,000, and possibly £200,000 of this is likely to have been funds donated in 1989 for the medical treatment of the late Brian Lenihan, however only £80,000 odd is known to have left the account for his benefit. Haughey has twice made public statements denying that the Lenihan fund was misused.
It was during the examination of withdrawals from the party leader's account that payments totalling £15,800, in April and September 1991, to the Paris shirt-makers, Charvet, were discovered. Payments totalling £15,000 to the Le Coq Hardi restaurant in 1990/1991 were also revealed. The evidence to date is that Haughey was given money which he placed in the party leader's account, and then withdrew for personal expenditure, rather than that he used Exchequer money to fund personal expenditure.
Not that that is much comfort to the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, who signed most of the cheques written in the period 1984 and 1992, and never noticed that anything unusual was afoot. He didn't even know that the Lenihan fund was lodged to the account. Evidence has been heard of the Taoiseach sitting down on one occasion and signing a whole book of blank cheques.
And it's not over yet. The questioning of the Revenue Commissioners in relation to Haughey's tax affairs is likely to provide some of the most interesting evidence yet. And there may be evidence concerning Haughey and the passports-for-sale scheme. And who knows, eventually, arising out of all this, Haughey might end up having to pay some tax for a change?