I heard Senator Mansergh decide that the issue of the Attorney General's intervention was a red herring. It was not. If one had listened to an eminent barrister on "Questions and Answers" last Monday night, one would have heard her say it was absolutely amazing that the religious congregations attended one of the meetings armed with their legal advisers while the Government did not have its legal representatives in place. That would appear obvious. Mr. Boland, an official of Deputy Woods's in the Department of Education and Science, remarked that while the Department achieved agreement in principle with CORI, it would have to be fine-tuned with the Attorney General, which never happened. The then Attorney General, Michael McDowell, did not want to be left out on a limb regarding this issue. He felt he was left outside the loop regarding many of the meetings. He had external matters to deal with and there were preparations to be made for the election etc., and maybe he might have taken his eye off the ball. However, it was a mistake to resolve the issue just a day into an election campaign. Maybe it was just a chance to clear the decks.