By the early 1980s it was apparent to the more ambitious politicians in Fianna Fáil and other parties that the nature of political organisation and campaigning required transformation, particularly in the cities.
The developing pattern of urbanisation and the increase in the scale and intensity of political campaigning meant that traditional reliance on party activists or branches was no longer adequate.
The formal party organisations were slow to adjust to the new realities of political competition in urban environments so some of the more effective new politicians set about building separate personal organisations in their constituencies. During elections canvassing machines were built specifically to carry out door-to-door work for a particular candidate.
Personalised posters began to appear, most of them erected by professional postering crews. Reliance on local volunteers to deliver campaign literature was replaced or supplemented by mail drops. Many politicians established full-time constituency organisations.
Bertie Ahern was a trailblazer in this regard. He was one of the first TDs to have a fully staffed constituency office. Until the late 1980s most deputies shared an office with at least one other TD in Leinster House and ran their constituency operation from their home. By comparison Ahern had access to reasonably extensive office space and meeting facilities at the heart of his constituency in St Luke's in Drumcondra.
From this base he built a massive political machine across Dublin Central. A network of ward bosses and street captains were responsible for nurturing support for him personally. They worked their designated turf all year round - every year, not just in election year.
This network and Ahern's near-constant canvassing schedule generated a mountain of constituency representations which were then efficiently processed by a relatively large cohort of staff back at St Luke's.
The apparatus of modern urban full-time campaigning is expensive. Building it and sustaining it requires funding - a lot of funding. Unless a candidate is wealthy personally, they must seek donations.
As personal campaigning grew more competitive, more money was needed, and so more donations were sought and received. Increasingly, because they were funding a personalised political operation, these donations were handled outside the traditional party financial channels.
In those days prior to the introduction of stringent regulations some politicians channelled this fundraising for their personalised political campaigns through a friendly local party branch while others simply lodged the money into their personal accounts.
The intermingling of funds worked both ways since candidates also spent a lot of their own money on their political operation.
This trend towards more professionalised and personalised campaigns began at a time when TDs were paid a lot less and when there were few exchequer supports to constituency activity. Nowadays an increasing amount of campaign and constituency infrastructure is funded from the public purse.
Charlie McCreevy's reign in the Department of Finance coincided with a significant improvement in the payments and allowances made available to TDs. A move to release space in the Leinster House complex led to the introduction of grants and incentives to encourage deputies to establish offices in their constituencies. Enhanced telephone allowances were introduced; improved technology and equipment were provided. Deputies have also been given a range of additional staffing allowances which most of them have used to enhance their local profile.
These early developments also occurred before the introduction of strict legal requirements on the segregation of political and personal funds. Deputies are now required by law to open a political account into which they must lodge all donations.
They must also furnish a bank statement for this account annually to the Standards in Public Office Commission showing full details of lodgements and withdrawals. Each year they must also swear a statutory declaration verifying that all funds withdrawn from this designated political account were deployed for political purposes.
Ahern's personal campaigning was greater than most and his constituency office infrastructure was the largest, so his political machine sought and obtained more political donations than most. The fact that he was the then minister for finance and one day likely to be Fianna Fáil leader is probably another reason why he received such a volume of donations.
There is little distinction between the personal and political lives of a TD. There was no distinction at all for Bertie Ahern. He was a separated man, a minister and a hyperactive constituency operator - politics was his life. The intermingling of political and personal funds was likely to have been even more confused in his case because, whether due of his separation or otherwise, he lived almost entirely on cash for a long period in the 1980s.
At least some of those who gave him political donations did not care whether he applied these funds to personal or political purposes. It did not matter to these donors whether Ahern used the money to buy suits or to buy leaflets, whether he spent it on drinks for his mates or drinks for his campaign workers.
Another complicating factor in Ahern's case is that as his party's national treasurer he was, in a non-executive sense at least, responsible for the party's national fundraising and some of his personal associates were involved centrally in national fundraising activity.
None of these factors excuse the chaos surrounding his personal and political finances during the late 1980s and 1990s but it does help to contextualise it.
Neither does it justify the hamfisted way he has sought to explain his lack of records. The book-keeping around his constituency organisation was clearly shambolic. The intermingling of personal and political finances has certainly given the Revenue Commissioners much to inquire into. Ahern has also unwisely left himself open to the suggestion that he was beholden to donors. None of it however comes close to establishing that he ever did anything corrupt, and it is all a long way from the original Gilmartin allegation.