Article a vital issue of public interest - editor

The editor of The Irish Times, Geraldine Kennedy, told the Mahon tribunal she considered she had a duty to publish a "vital issue of public interest" - that the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, had received payments from businessmen when he was a serving minister in 1993.

Ms Kennedy had also said The Irish Timeshad received "an unsolicited and anonymous communication" about the payments which, she considered, the newspaper should verify and publish in the public interest.

"This is not a situation where an allegation of payment has been made that is denied, or is false," she said. "The fact of these payments is admitted."

Ms Kennedy made the comments in a written reply of September 22nd, 2006 to a letter from the tribunal expressing concern that The Irish Timesarticle about the payments published the previous day was based on a document described by the tribunal as confidential and related to the private stage of its proceedings.

Ms Kennedy wrote that The Irish Timesrespected the important public function of the tribunal but, she added: 'This does not, however, mean this newspaper will desist from discharging its separate duty to publish matters in the public interest. I think you might agree," she added, "that no single person or entity in this State (including this newspaper) has a monopoly on supporting constitutional democracy." She also said The Irish Timeshad not breached any Supreme Court order in publishing the material complained of.

Denis McDonald SC, for the tribunal, said Ms Kennedy and the author of the article, Public Affairs Correspondent Colm Keena, had later refused to assist the tribunal in either establishing the source or the avenue of communication for the information in the article.

Mr Keena had even refused to confirm the truth or otherwise of Ms Kennedy's assertion in her letter that the communication received by Mr Keena was "anonymous", counsel said.

Mr Keena had stated he had undertaken a verification process extending over some two days in relation to the article and stood over it.

Ms Kennedy had told the tribunal she had asked Mr Keena to destroy the document and that was done. She said this was not out of disrespect to the tribunal and its important role but to protect sources.

Because Mr Keena's article had referred to a tribunal letter to David McKenna and quoted sections of that letter, it appeared Mr Keena had seen that letter or a copy of it, counsel said. He said the original letter to Mr McKenna had on it the tribunal logo, a harp, and the signature of tribunal solicitor Susan Gilvarry. If the copy seen by Mr Keena had the harp and signature, then that copy had not come from the tribunal, he submitted.

Mr McKenna had been understandably very aggrieved about the publication of these matters and his solicitors had engaged in frequent correspondence with the tribunal in "trenchant terms", Mr McDonald said.

In the continuing absence of identification of the source, the integrity of the tribunal and confidence in its ongoing work continued to be undermined, he said. The tribunal had a constitutional obligation to protect the privacy of those it was dealing with in private session and the necessary corollary to that obligation was that it was entitled to ask the court to take steps to ensure that was done.

If The Irish Timeswould even now say whether the document it saw had the harp and signature or confirm that the tribunal was not the source of its information, that would bring these proceedings to "a complete stop", counsel said. However, they would not say so and the tribunal had come up against "a stone wall".