The Government's offer to indemnify 18 religious congregations against abuse compensation claims was cleared with the Attorney General's Office, the Taoiseach has said.
However, the leader of the Labour Party, Mr Pat Rabbitte, is set to investigate further the arrangement between the Government and the Conference of Religious in Ireland.
In the Dáil Mr Ahern rejected charges that the indemnity, which was finally agreed a day before the last cabinet went out of office on June 6th, had not been properly legally "fire-proofed".
"The Attorney General and his office were involved during the entire period. All of the issues came fully in front of the Government," Mr Ahern told Mr Rabbitte during testy exchanges.
Privately, Labour believes the legal document detailing the terms of the indemnity was written by the solicitors for the congregations, rather than by the Attorney General's Office.
In addition, Labour believes the document was agreed without the involvement of the Attorney General's Office as Dr Michael Woods, then minister for education, prepared to leave office.
A spokesman for the Government said the attorney general, Mr McDowell, who is now Minister for Justice, had "sight of the indemnity and provided advice to the Government in the normal way".
Negotiations between officials from Education, Finance and the Attorney General's Office and CORI began in November 2000, but by October 2001 they had become log-jammed.
The minister for education, Dr Woods, then became directly involved, along with his secretary-general, Mr John Dennehy. An agreement on a €128 million contribution by the congregations was agreed on January 30th, 2002.
So far, it is known that Dr Woods did not involve legal staff from the Department of Education in the post-October 2001 negotiations, although the knowledge in the AG's Office is less clear.
Talks on the exact scope of the indemnity continued from then until the final days of the last government. Yesterday Dr Woods insisted that all normal cabinet procedures were followed.
"The attorney general was very actively involved at every stage in the indemnity," said Dr Woods, who is now chairman of the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs Committee.
In the Dáil Mr Ahern rejected Mr Rabbitte's charge that Mr McDowell should have been directly involved in the negotiations. "When Mr Woods and his secretary-general and one of his officials dealt with the meetings they did not need anybody holding their hands. It means that when a minister goes to negotiate he does not need three more ministers with him. He does it by himself. We trust our colleagues," he went on.
The Taoiseach confirmed that during the 2001 talks the Department of Finance wanted the congregations to pay 50 per cent of all compensation offered to victims, although he did not make it clear when that demand was dropped.
In sharp exchanges with Mr Rabbitte and other Opposition TDs, Mr Ahern said he would not publish details of the 3,000 possible compensation cases held on file by Education when it signed the indemnity.
