The full text of the speech by Fine Gael Leader, Enda Kenny, on the Motion of No Confidence in An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern
Ceann Comhairle, this motion has been moved because my Party does not have confidence in the Taoiseach.
This debate here must focus on three themes:
Firstly, standards in public office. Is it acceptable for a senior politician to accept large sums of money for his private use or not?
Secondly, has the Taoiseach cooperated freely and fully with the Mahon Tribunal?
Thirdly, and by far the most important issue, is whether the Taoiseach has been telling the truth to the Irish people, to this Dáil and to the Mahon Tribunal. Because if the Irish people have a Taoiseach whom they cannot believe, then they cannot have trust and confidence in him or indeed in his Government.
This is not a debate about the peace process, the economy, the European Union or many other smoke screens which Fianna Fáil, Green and PD Ministers will seek to introduce into the debate.
On 11 February 1992 in this chamber, Charles J Haughey, on the day of his resignation as Taoiseach felt the need to affirm himself. He had, he said, 'done the state some service'.
You, Taoiseach, have no need to make that statement about yourself. I will make it for you. You have done the State some service.
Thousands of people in this island will live in peace and in trust in part because of your work. The Good Friday Agreement which you piloted through with former Prime Minister Blair, wrote an end to years of hatred and of misery.
It required people of all traditions to relinquish the worst of their past and to express what Abraham Lincoln called 'the better angels' of their humanity.
You had my full support in pursuing this worthy objective with all your diligence and commitment. I do not, therefore, deny that you did the State some service.
In the past period, you have obviously been concerned that what you perceive as your reputation and legacy might be tainted, or tarnished or even erased. You have lashed out at the media, at the Mahon Tribunal and at everybody but the one person responsible for tainting that reputation.
· That person is the man who saw the equivalent of 300,000 in cash in today's terms lodged to his or his partner's accounts. · That person is the individual whose explanations for those lodgements change by the day. · That person is the one who occupies the highest political office in the land and whose credibility is now in shreds - that person, Taoiseach, is you.
When Members of this House on all sides go to vote on this motion they should ask themselves one simple question.
Do I believe the Taoiseach?
If you do believe the Taoiseach, if you believe his many twisted and tortured accounts of how he came to lodge 300,000 in today's terms over two years, if you believe that he cannot remember memorable events like changing 30,000 pounds into Sterling, if you believe that he gave the Tribunal everything that they sought when they sought it; then you can vote confidence in the Taoiseach.
That is your choice, that is the choice that Fine Gael is providing you with.
But if, you agree with my Party that the Taoiseach cannot be believed on these matters then vote no confidence in him.
Standards On the 3rd October last year Deputy Sargent told the House that "what the Taoiseach did in taking money from businesses and business men was and is totally inappropriate and improper. It was unethical and wrong."
Deputy Sargent was correct. Along with other members of the Opposition at the time, we said that the Taoiseach was wrong.
We now know that the scale of money which the Taoiseach lodged to various accounts between December 1993 and December 1995 amounts to 300,000 euro in today's money terms. The recent hearings focused on four of those lodgements which equate to 45,000 dollars, £25,000 sterling, £20,000 sterling and £10,000 sterling. We have heard no credible explanation from the Taoiseach for these lodgements. In the absence of such an explanation the deep suspicion must remain that these lodgements were a result of personal contributions made to the Taoiseach.
Last year the Taoiseach said repeatedly that he did no wrong. His Ministers to a man and a woman backed him. One year later we now know that the amounts of money concerned did not just come from two so called whip-rounds and an alleged dinner totalling IR£48,000, but rather a series of lodgements which come to 300,000 in today's terms.
But the response of the Taoiseach and his Ministers is exactly the same. "I did no wrong"; "he did no wrong". That is the standard that those who vote confidence in the Taoiseach tonight will be setting for themselves and for their parties.
The scale may well be different from that of Mr Haughey. But scale does not alter standards. It may well have happened at a time of change for the Taoiseach. But circumstances do not alter standards.
To take such monies for personal use was simply wrong. If it was wrong for Charles Haughey, then it was wrong for Deputy Ahern.
Cooperation Nothing illustrates the bare faced brazenness of the Taoiseach than his repeated assurances to the Irish people delivered directly on TV or in this House that he has cooperated fully and freely with the Mahon Tribunal.
On the 13th May 2007, in the middle of the Election campaign, the Taoiseach told the Irish people "the Tribunal has come back to me at various points and asked me to explain particular transactions in my bank accounts. I provided those explanations".
The point is, Taoiseach, you did not provide those explanations. You did not provide them in private correspondence with the tribunal and you did not provide them at a private interview with the Tribunal. That is why you had to attend to the Tribunal to give sworn testimony for four days in the last two weeks.
The Taoiseach says he fully cooperated with the Tribunal. That is just not true.
On 13th September in sworn evidence he accepted that he had not supplied the Tribunal with the comprehensive information it requested concerning cash lodgements being investigated by the Tribunal over two and half years.
The Taoiseach said that he freely cooperated with the Tribunal. That is not true. At the Tribunal on 13th September correspondence was opened which revealed that at one stage the Tribunal threatened the Taoiseach with a summons because of his failure to supply information.
The Taoiseach told RTE's Bryan Dobson on the Six One News on 26th September that he had given full disclosure of all his records. That is not true. He did not include in a sworn affidavit details of the transfer of £50,000 to an account which his partner had opened for his benefit.
Telling the truth The Taoiseach's explanations of lodgements to his accounts over two years have been riddled with inconsistency and received with incredulity.
He has changed his stories on lodgements as the Tribunal's investigations uncovered more and more hard facts.
His explanations for critical lodgements are completely at odds with evidence available in bank documents.
His challenge to the Tribunal's view that 45,000 dollars was lodged has been blown away.
He agrees that five sterling transactions were memorable events yet he can remember no critical details.
He told the Tribunal he could have lodged money with a bank official he then admitted he had never met.
He told the Irish people on the Six One News last year that the money he had saved was gone, but he has admitted to the Tribunal that when he first received £22,500 in December 1993 he already had £70,000.
His explanation for the so called Manchester dinner is simply incredible. He can't identify the date, he can't remember who was there and there is no documentary evidence whatsoever to support the notion that the event took place as he described it.
He told the Irish people that he had fully cooperated with the Tribunal. But it is clear that he withheld critical information from the Tribunal.
He told the Irish people that he freely cooperated with the Tribunal but it is clear that the Tribunal had to threaten him to cooperate.
A recent opinion poll indicated that 32% of the Irish people believed the Taoiseach. I wish those people were asked, which story do you believe? Which version of the Taoiseach's fairytales do you believe?
One year ago the Taoiseach's finances became the dominant political issue of the country. Looking back at the period, and especially with the benefit of the public disclosure of the forensic work of the Mahon Tribunal, I am convinced that the convulsions which we went through counted for nothing. Why?
Because most of the events we were discussing never happened. In my view, in my opinion, they're fictitious. Complicated stories, part of a web of complicated stories designed to mask hard facts. Constructed stories to fit known facts.
Facts like the lodgement into the Taoiseach and Celia Larkin's accounts of the equivalent 300,000 in today's terms. Facts like the bank documentation created at the time of the lodgements which point to lodgements of 45,000 dollars, £25,000 sterling, £20,000 sterling, £10,000 sterling. Facts like the persistent failure of the Taoiseach to provide the Tribunal with information on the source of these funds.
Instead we became besotted with stories about whip-rounds, after dinner presentations and more recently a bag of sterling to refurbish a virtually new house.
The Mahon Tribunal will continue its work. It will continue to treat the Taoiseach as he has asked to be treated, like every other citizen. Its members and staff will continue their efforts to get to the truth behind the facts it has already uncovered.
But the public interest and the protection of the reputation of the highest executive office of the land, the office of An Taoiseach, demands that the charade that is currently being played out is ended. And ended now.
Because, the Taoiseach's stories are threadbare. His evidence invisible.
But with blind loyalty his Ministers: Cowen, Martin, Taoiseach, Hanafin, Lenihan, O'Cuiv, Cullen, Brennan, Dempsey, Coughlan and, O'Dea have all come out to support the yarns he has spun.
And what about the other Ministers in this Government.
Remember the slogan: Green politics is clean politics. Well now Green Politics is blind politics as Ministers Gormely, Ryan and Sargent adopt the standards we have come to associate with the PDs.
Last year, Deputy Sargent, a man of impeccable standards and principles sat on this side of the house. An admirable man, who, week after week, rose to his feet to exonerate the lack of standards manifest in taking this money.
That man now sits behind the Taoiseach, his mind changed, utterly changed by having been seduced by the attraction of power.
And in the PDs, there is one Deputy who had the courage on much less evidence to take the enormous personal risk of challenging the then Taoiseach, Charles Haughey. A woman, then with standards, who said 'I can not live with this, nor should my Party have to live with this'.
Now …it's the silence of the lambs.
Mahon In time, the Mahon Tribunal will come to its conclusions. We now know that some of the criticism made of the tribunal and its cost and the time it was taking is not down to the Tribunal but to the individuals they were investigating. It will reach a conclusion on whether specific allegations made are true. We can and will wait for their verdict on those issues.
The Office of the Taoiseach But we must not wait, and the office of the Taoiseach cannot wait, for the Tribunal to report.
And I have no choice. I have no choice as the Leader of the Opposition and as the most senior deputy in the House, but to stand by our republic, and to stand by the standards necessary in public life, to stand by and demand that we get the truth.
The longer we fail to say that this Taoiseach cannot be believed, the more we damage the high office he holds.
The longer we fail to say that this Taoiseach cannot be believed, the more we demean the profession of politics.
The longer we fail to say that this Taoiseach cannot be believed, the more we increase the cynicism about politics, especially among young people.
So lets be clear across all sides of this house. If we let the current charade continue, politics and political office will suffer.
Before concluding I want to make a broader point about this whole shabby affair.
And I make it to this House, and beyond the House, to two groups in particular:
Those who are concerned about the erosion of values in our society. And those who see this whole thing as something that doesn't matter, 'politics as usual', and nothing to do with them.
Unlike, the Government, all the parties of this Government, FF, Green and the two PDs
I believe it is never right, it is always wrong, to accept private monies, for private use while wielding public power and holding high public office.
Because I believe that when you take up high public office, you do cross a moral threshold. Yes, you face the same problems, the same traumas as the next person. But unlike the next person, you have power given to you by the people, you hold high public office, therefore a higher standard, a better standard must apply. That is both the privilege and the consequence of holding high office.
I live in the real world. I recognise that there's a permissiveness, a relativism, a new cult of sure-who-gives-a-damn-once-I'm-alright- Jack that makes the idea of 'morality' something to be laughed at, or even something to be embarrassed about
But, as parliamentarians, I believe we have a job, and a duty, to rise above that.
Call me old-fashioned, call me behind the times, but I believe that as parliamentarians, we, especially, need to rehabilitate that word 'morality'.
Because if we don't lay down the strong foundations of what is acceptable, desirable behaviour in our government, in our country, in our society, then who will?
In terms of the nation who will define and guide our better instincts? Who will lead the debate on right and wrong, on being truthful and accountable at all times, on what is acceptable and unacceptable. That debate, for the good of our future and all our people should include, if not be led, by the Taoiseach. But that is now an impossibility.
I do not want the children of this country growing up where nothing is ever 'right' or ever 'wrong' where all kinds of behaviour are tolerated and accepted, where the truth is not respected , because now everything falls into the cursed, convenient no-mans-land of permissiveness, where anything will do because anything goes?
I know the kind of Ireland I want for my children, for all our children.
And I know that what we do about this particular mess, as a Government, as Ministers, as parliamentarians, as a society, will go a long way to deciding the kind of Ireland it will be.
Conclusion At the start of my contribution I said we should focus on three questions
Was the Taoiseach right to take large sums of money for personal use? My answer: he was wrong
Did the Taoiseach fully and freely co-operate with the Tribunal. My answer: he did not.
Has the Taoiseach told the truth to the Irish people, to this Dáil and to the Mahon Tribunal. My answer: he has not.
That's why I do not have confidence in him as Taoiseach.