Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

I offer my apologies to the House that I am back for the fourth day out of five to answer these issues. I can only answer them to the best of my ability.

I will answer all the questions without taking too long. I believe I have answered every question I have been asked in a full and frank manner over the past number of days. I believe I have answered them in a very complete way but I will do so again.

I did not introduce any issues relevant to my house into any of the debates or into the interviews I did last week or into the debate in the House because I did not believe I was under any investigation regarding my house. The Mahon tribunal asked me for details about my house because, when I provided disclosure of all the information, the details about my house would have been clear. I gave all that information to the Mahon tribunal.

The tribunal has all the details of my house file and the file of the person who sold me the house. The person from whom I initially rented the house, 44 Beresford Avenue off Griffith Avenue in Drumcondra, was Michael Wall of Cong and Manchester. I paid full market rent. I rented the house for about two years. The rent was reviewed on a second lease and it went up. It was a very good market rent. I subsequently bought the house in the autumn of 1997, after I became Taoiseach. Mr. Wall would have had a gain of about 30% in the two and a half years. I paid the full market value for the house and I funded it by means of an Irish Permanent Building Society loan. I paid the stamp duty and all the relevant taxes from my current account. In answer to Deputy Higgins, the deposit was not a large sum and I paid it from my building society deposit book. I have given all these details to the tribunal. Michael Wall also has given all the details he was asked to provide to the tribunal.

With regard to the Manchester event, I tried last week to locate the people in Manchester who attended that function. However, I was at several functions. As I stated the other day, many people have told me they were probably at that function but I was not able to pin down exactly who was there. As I stated to the House, I probably know all the people who attended that function in Manchester but without talking to all of them, I cannot pin down exactly who attended it. As I attended various functions in Manchester over the years, I cannot state with certainty who were the other persons in attendance. I do not wish to mistakenly name someone and then be accused of misleading the House.

I know Michael Wall well and of course I remember from whom I bought my house. I spoke to him three times last weekend, twice on Saturday and once on Sunday. I asked him whether he could help me by stating whether he had attended the function and whether he could help me identify any of the others because I wanted to give as many names as possible to the House. He told me that he was not one of the 25. He did not attend the dinner that day but he was in the hotel in a working capacity, using his coach minibus. He confirmed he met me in the bar and that he spoke to people in the bar afterwards.

Subsequently while travelling, he received a call from somebody from Clonbur whom he knew and who is a journalist with Raidió na Gaeltachta. He did not give an interview to somebody in Raidió na Gaeltachta. He was on his way to the UK when he was asked and he gave that short interview.

To ensure completeness for the House, I spoke to the Tánaiste on Tuesday morning and this was prior to Rónán giving the interview to Pat Kenny. Therefore, it is obvious I did not know anything about that interview at the time so I did not raise that issue with the Tánaiste either then or subsequently. The Tánaiste had no knowledge of this. I did not put Mr. Wall's name into the public domain because he told me he was not one of the 25 people, that he did not contribute and that he did not attend the meal, but he confirmed that he was in the hotel in a working capacity. He gave this information on the programme.

However, he also stated on the radio that he was aware that I had received money because he was there and he was well acquainted with the people who were there. He gave me some other names of people whom I tried to contact but, at this remove, it is impossible to pin down who attended the function and I am unable to do it. I did not mention his name because he and others had told me he was not one of the 25 people.

On the question of what the Progressive Democrats did or did not know, I have stated that they did not know about Michael Wall because I never told them the name of the person from whom I bought my house. However, I told the tribunal and I made a full disclosure to it.

Deputy Ó Caoláin asked whether I was dealing with the tribunal on these issues and the answer is that I was. He asked whether I informed the Progressive Democrats I had received loans from friends and the answer is "yes, I did". He asked whether I informed them about Michael Wall and the answer is "no, I did not". This is the truthful position.

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