The two tribunals have risen for the summer and will not restart their work again until September. Both have continually revealed the unsavoury way public affairs were conducted by some people, people in high places, in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Both have come in for criticism. But it is probably fair to say that Mr Justice Flood has borne more than his fair share of the criticism.
Notwithstanding that and concerns about costs (which will be added to by the strange dispute between the Criminal Assets Bureau and Mr Justice Flood), it remains critical that the issues at the heart of both tribunals are resolved.
At the moment there's a perception in some quarters that the public is punch-drunk from the material unearthed by the tribunals and that the sheer scale of Mr Haughey's misdeeds are such that those of everybody else pale in comparison.
Time will tell. For my part, I suspect that the public has suspended judgment and that it is the political process, not individual politicians, that have suffered thus far. But issues have arisen that pertain to public and parliamentary accountability and which still have to be answered. And many of those answers will have to come from the Taoiseach himself.
The recent revelations about Mr Ahern's role as a signatory to the Fianna Fail party leader's allowance account is one case in point. It has been said that the countersigning of cheques is a common practice in clubs all over the country. Perhaps, but this practice is almost always followed up by the scrutiny of a penny-pinching committee - no such scrutiny in this "club" - and seldom are such cheques eventually cashed for £25,000.
Why the Taoiseach remained a signatory to the account long after he relinquished the position of chief whip, the original reason offered for his role in this affair, is still a mystery.
Of more immediate concern is the manner in which the Taoiseach has dealt with this and other issues in the Dail. Some have argued that there should be little or no discussion of tribunal-related issues in the House and perhaps, in a perfect world, they may be right.
But the reality is that before the tribunals were set up these issues were discussed in the House, and the integrity of the Dail record isn't something we can afford to treat lightly. Neither should we allow the position of high offices of State to be undermined by questions surrounding particular office-holders.
On the face of it the Taoiseach would appear to agree. On June 3rd last year he told the Dail: "It seems to me as a general principle that those who have enjoyed the trust and support of ordinary party members, of the electorate and of this House, and who have achieved high office and positions of great trust over a number of years, owe a full and frank explanation to the country that should not have to be extracted from them by tribunals of inquiry."
Unfortunately, the Taoiseach has fallen short of his own benchmark.
AT THE time the Moriarty tribunal was established the Labour Party argued that the use of the Fianna Fail party leader's allowance should be included in its terms of reference. In fact we tabled an amendment to that effect.
Rejecting these amendments, the Taoiseach said he had examined the accounts, spoken to the person involved and, in so far as he could be, was satisfied that the money had been used for bona-fide party purposes.
When the revelations emerged that a cheque drawn on the party leader's allowance account for £25,000, signed by Mr Ahern in June 1989, ended up in a Celtic Helicopters account, I asked the Taoiseach to correct the record of the House, as is the custom when the record is found to be inaccurate.
The Taoiseach chose not to do so. He pointed out that his stated satisfaction with the account in September 1997 only referred to the period under Haughey's leadership when Fianna Fail was in opposition. It was his deliberate concentration on the period spent in opposition that is important. But why he chose to do so is strange. He stated that Dick Spring had raised this precise issue with him.
However, the Labour Party amendments tabled that day covered not just the years when Fianna Fail was in opposition, but every year between 1983 and 1992. And even if the Taoiseach spoke without prior knowledge of this amendment, a letter to him from Dick Spring a few days previously had covered the same ground.
The Taoiseach's story was further undermined on July 14th, when the Moriarty tribunal revealed the existence of further cheques to the value of £35,000 drawn on the party leader's allowance account, again signed by the Taoiseach, possibly for the personal use of Mr Haughey but this time drawn down in 1986, the period in which FF was in opposition and under the Taoiseach's own admission covering the period in which he gave answers in the Dail.
On 25th May last, again in the Dail, Mr Ahern said that he had "not subsequently received or heard any information to indicate that there was anything wrong with any matter during the 1982-87 period". Well, he has now.
But the Taoiseach's difficulty in squaring what he has said in the House and what has emerged later in evidence given to the tribunals has also applied to revelations from the Flood tribunal.
In particular, to this day, the Taoiseach's decision to appoint Ray Burke minister for foreign affairs remains shrouded in mystery.
The Tanaiste, in her evidence to the Flood tribunal on Mr Burke's appointment, stated: "Yes, he [Taoiseach] told me he had fully investigated the matter, that Ray Burke had received £30,000 from Mr Gogarty, JMSE". But how could the Taoiseach make such an unequivocal declaration to the Tanaiste?
Before forming his Cabinet the Taoiseach dispatched Dermot Ahern to London to make inquiries about the JMSE donation to Ray Burke. On his return Dermot Ahern informed the Taoiseach that Joseph Murphy jnr denied making any payment to Mr Burke. In his conversations with Mr Burke, the Taoiseach never specifically asked him if he received money from JMSE. Mr Burke denies ever telling the Taoiseach that the money came from JMSE.
So, before he formed his Cabinet, Bertie Ahern knew that the "donor" denied making the payment and he never asked the recipient if he actually received a payment. How then was Bertie Ahern able to tell Mary Harney that Ray Burke got £30,000 from JMSE?
What led him to conclude that Joseph Murphy jnr had misled Dermot Ahern?
Why did he confidently appoint Ray Burke to Cabinet when, according to the Tanaiste, he knew Mr Burke had received £30,000 and also that the donor was denying making the payment.
Finally, why did the Taoiseach tell the Dail on May 28th that "on the day I appointed the then Deputy Burke as minister I was working on the understanding that no money had been given to him"?
To date the Taoiseach has refused to provide adequate answers to these questions. It suits the Taoiseach to allow contradictory and confusing versions of events remain on the public record. It also suits his Tanaiste, Mary Harney.
BEFORE Mr Burke's appointment to Cabinet Ms Harney received information that Ray Burke had received a substantial payment from JMSE in connection with planning permission. Later Ms Harney found from the same source that Mr Dermot Ahern had gone to London to make inquiries about this payment. Did Mary Harney ask about the result of these inquiries? If not, why not? If she did not, how can she be satisfied now when she knows she did not receive the truth or anything close to it from the Taoiseach?
In short, the Tanaiste, after receiving alarming information from a well-placed source within JMSE, effectively connived in the appointment of Mr Burke in her headlong rush to get the PDs into Government. Ms Harney, in common with the Taoiseach, has good reason to sweep the events of June 1997 under the carpet.
When the controversy about payments to Mr Burke was at its height in the summer of 1997, Deputy Sean Fleming, a former financial director of the party, was asked by then general secretary of FF, Pat Farrell, to check this donation. According to Mr Fleming he "checked the cash receipts book and was satisfied we had received £10,000 through Mr Ray Burke during the 1989 election campaign and that this contribution had been from Rennicks".
He told Pat Farrell this at a meeting in the summer of 1997, which was also attended by the party's fund-raiser, Mr Des Richardson.
And notwithstanding the fact that all three were aware that Burke's statement to the Dail on September 10th, 1997, in which he stated the same money had come from JMSE, was inaccurate, and that, by supporting Burke's continuation as minister the Taoiseach was putting his own reputation and that of his Government on the line, we are asked to believe that nobody told the Taoiseach about it. With friends like this, you'd hardly need enemies.
When the tribunals resume their public work next month the answers to some of these issues, and others that will undoubtedly emerge, may be revealed. But what has been unearthed already justifies the decision to establish the tribunals, despite carping from some quarters. In response to some of these revelations, the Taoiseach has given uncertain and contradictory responses.
I hope he will use the resumption of the Dail to address these issues. In the meantime, judgment may be suspended but it cannot be postponed indefinitely.
Ruairi Quinn TD, is leader of the Labour Party