Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The revelations in last Sunday's edition of Sunday Independent relating to the transcript of a conversation between Deputy Michael Lowry and Mr. Kevin Phelan are quite dramatic and startling. Deputy Michael Lowry has made his statement and I do not propose to deal with that issue today. What concerns me most, as one of many Members who set up the Moriarty tribunal, is whether the tribunal was continually undermined in its efforts to get to the full truth of the issues it was investigating.

I want to refer to documentation Senator Diarmuid Wilson received from Mr. Phelan, providing detail of approximately 60 meetings attended by Deputy Michael Lowry in connection with the so-called Doncaster deal. The Senator has forwarded the material to the chairman of the tribunal and understands there are other related issues that will come down the tracks and has undertaken to send any material he receives directly to the chairman of the tribunal.

Taking this material together - the material the Senator received and the transcript of the conversation - one is left with an uneasy feeling that the tribunal was not told the full truth or that groups of people - witnesses - were meeting, telephoning and engaging with each other before giving evidence to the tribunal. I suggest, at a minimum, that that is both unhealthy and disturbing. Clear contradictions are emerging between what was said at the tribunal and what is now emerging in the material to which I have referred. These contradictions are very difficult to reconcile.

The tribunal was established by and is a creature of the Oireachtas. All of us have a solemn duty and obligation to stand by it and its chairperson and ensure it was enabled to go about its work unhindered and unobstructed, receiving truthful evidence and the fullest co-operation from all concerned. On behalf of the House, will the Taoiseach facilitate a re-examination of these issues by the tribunal? It is in his gift to do so.

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