The Taoiseach has again sharply criticised the receipt of huge sums of money by Mr Charles Haughey, while defending his former leader's record of "excellent public service".
In a lengthy interview last night on Network 2's Later with O'Leary programme, Mr Ahern said: "Charles Haughey was a great minister, he was a great leader, he did an awful lot of good things for this country. He gave excellent public service."
While stating that he had admired Mr Haughey, he said of his asking for large sums of money from wealthy individuals: "That was not public service".
Mr Ahern said he could not stand over "a person involved in public service using that position for whatever motive and asking for the kinds of money that he did and I'm not going to defend that."
He added: "I can stand over what he did, so many good things for the elderly, the less well-off in Irish society, the Financial Services Centre." Mr Ahern said Mr Haughey had never asked him to make a decision that would have compromised him. However in his strongest criticism of the former Taoiseach he said: "When Charles Haughey said in 1980 in what was probably his most famed speech that the country had. . .to live within its means. . . .that we had to cut our cloth according to what was available, it's a pity he didn't live by that himself."
He said he had never discussed Mr Haughey's finances with him. Asked if he ever wondered where Mr Haughey's money came from, Mr Ahern said: "I never drank the Lynch-Bages and I wouldn't know a Charvet shirt so I never questioned him on those things."