The Taoiseach should ask Liam Lawlor to resign his Dail seat with immediate effect, the Fine Gael leader, Mr John Bruton, has said.
In Mallow yesterday, following a meeting of the Fine Gael front bench, Mr Bruton said he understood this was a particularly difficult time for Mr Lawlor and his family, but he had brought the situation about himself.
In his own interest, the interests of his family as well as the body politic, he should remove himself from politics. Mr Ahern, who had "dithered" in his approach to the Lawlor affair even before his resignation as vice-chairman of the ethics committee of the Dail, should now offer Mr Lawlor the benefit of his advice and ask him to step down immediately.
"I am inviting the Taoiseach to say that he has reflected on the situation and that he now realises it would be better for everyone if Mr Lawlor stood down from the Dail like Ray Burke did before him," Mr Bruton added.
It was surprising, he said, that Mr Ahern was unable to give a direct answer when asked if Mr Lawlor should resign his Dail seat in view of the fact that he had failed to co-operate with a tribunal which was an instrument of the Dail.
Fine Gael was preparing to ask the Dail Committee on Procedures and Privileges to examine the situation and to say what should be done when a member of the Dail behaved in such a manner. Members of the House were suspended for interrupting its business, but what Mr Lawlor had done was far more serious, he said.
Fine Gael would also be put ting down a motion calling on Mr Lawlor to be discharged from the Joint Committee on Finance and the Public Service and from the Joint Committee on Public Enterprise and Transport.
"The time has come for the Taoiseach to make up his mind," Mr Bruton said. "It is not fitting or sustainable for Mr Lawlor, as a legislator who helped establish this tribunal of inquiry to assist the Dail in see king the truth, to obstruct the same tribunal in its important work. It is entirely unsatisfactory but not surprising that Mr Ahern should fail today to offer Liam Lawlor this advice and ask him to resign, as I have done . . .
"To survive as Taoiseach, Mr Ahern depends on Liam Lawlor's vote. It is therefore not surprising that the Taoiseach will yet again wait until the very last moment to take minimal action and only then when forced to do so." The only way to put an end to Mr Ahern's dependency was to have a general election, Mr Bruton added.
In light of the recent scandals, Mr Bruton continued, it was not tenable for Fianna Fail to put forward an electoral Bill which would increase by 50 per cent the party's level of expenditure on elections and by the same amount the level of funding it could receive through private donations.