Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

It is fair to state that the Opposition has shown restraint in the matter of the Taoiseach accepting money for private use while a Minister. However, since Mr. Ahern had created a context that sought to explain the Drumcondra moneys in terms of his private family affairs, common decency required that Opposition politicians should have demonstrated a certain restraint. Today, for the first time, he seeks to drag the Manchester moneys into that same category. On Sunday, I heard the Minister of State, Deputy Conor Lenihan, ridicule Opposition restraint. It was, he said, ineffectiveness, not decency, on the part of the Opposition. The suggestion, apparently, is that the Opposition should cut through the smokescreen to the heart of the matter.

To me the heart of the matter is this; did the Taoiseach do wrong? Is it remotely credible that moneys outstanding for 13 years, without repayment of any kind, can suddenly be categorised as loans? One does not need to be as bright as the Minister of State, Deputy Conor Lenihan, to know that these transactions, if they happened, were gifts and therefore have tax implications.

On the Manchester moneys, can we do more than highlight the absolute impropriety of a serving Minister for Finance accepting payment for a nixer outside the State? Never mind the "no law was broken" defence. By any standards, it was wrong. What would have happened, as Deputy Kenny asked, to a senior civil servant in the Department of Finance if he had trousered private money from such an event? He would have been dismissed. Why is it all right for the Minister for Finance but not all right for a civil servant in his Department?

What does one say about this Government's standards when not a single Cabinet Minister can bring himself or herself to say that what happened at Manchester was wrong? One would believe in the tooth fairy if one believes that businessmen happen along to a function in a posh hotel to listen to any old Joe Soap lecture on the Irish economy and then organise an impromptu whip around to give him something for himself. In normal life one gets gifts from one's friends and one takes loans from strangers. Yet, Mr. Ahern says he got loans from his friends and took gifts from strangers.

Maybe the Minister of State, Deputy Conor Lenihan's, derision of the Opposition is because we did not adequately probe the discreet veil drawn over the other €50,000 which Mr. Ahern enigmatically tells us he put back into his account. "Back into his account from where?" is the question that must be answered. Where was the €50,000 resting since the then Minister, Deputy Bertie Ahern, did not have a bank account? Was it resting in a sock or in the hot press? If the Taoiseach says this €50,000 was savings, I accept that, but he enjoyed a ministerial and Deputy's salary and the use of a premises bought for him by friends of Fianna Fáil. In those circumstances, how can he be portrayed as living in straitened conditions? If he had €50,000 in savings, why was it necessary to raise a bank loan? If a bank loan was in place, why was it necessary to have a whip-around to replace the bank loan?

Any Opposition doing its job must ask the Taoiseach whether he has evaded tax. Why did he say that he paid capital gains tax and gift tax? How is it relevant in this case? Is he serious when he tells the country that he had no bank account when he was Minister for Finance? Did he have a bank account elsewhere on the island? Did he have a bank account outside the jurisdiction or did someone open an account on his behalf? If the whip-around was among friends, why was a company cheque issued for £5,000 from NCB? How many times has NCB been retained by the State? How does this sit with the Taoiseach's claim that they were friends and not big business? How many of the donors were appointed on how many occasions to State boards? Who were the donors in Manchester whose identity the Tánaiste said he needed to know? We are now down to two donors, one of whom is deceased. What was that function? Are these people involved in business in Ireland and did they get State contracts? Is this another loop in the golden circle?

Our new Tánaiste is also impatient with the Opposition. On Thursday, he told the House that he could scarcely forebear to sit there and watch the Opposition squander its accountability time.

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