Mr Charles Haughey told the tribunal he used his home at Abbeville, in Kinsealy, Co Dublin when he was Taoiseach and Fianna Fail leader to entertain foreign diplomats and visitors from Northern Ireland who did not want the glare of publicity.
In his evidence, read into the record, he said Abbeville was used from 1979 to 1991 and was a major centre of activity for foreign affairs, diplomacy, party activities and business.
When he came into office as Taoiseach in 1979, there was a proposal to build a Taoiseach's residence in the Phoenix Park but he stopped it.
He decided that Abbeville would suit perfectly well as the Taoiseach's residence and it did fulfil that role in a major way. "There was no particular need for any sparkling new armoured palace in the Phoenix Park, and Abbeville would fill the terms of whatever ancillary things had to be done as party leader, as Taoiseach," he said.
"For instance, Abbeville would be staffed, manned by people from the Taoiseach's office at weekends because we would be meeting people, receiving deputations, entertaining people, and a whole variety of activities all undertaken on behalf of Ireland and the Government or the party," he said.
Relating to all these expenditures in Abbeville, his staff, like Ms Eileen Foy and Ms Catherine Butler, would try and insist that he be recompensed for these Abbeville activities. "They would take the initiative in trying to keep that balance."
Mr Haughey gave an example of something that would not fall into either State or party category.
"At that time, we would be very active in receiving deputations, visitors, individuals from Northern Ireland. Abbeville was ideal from that point of view, because a lot of these people wouldn't like to be coming, facing the glare of publicity in Government Buildings or in Leinster House, and Abbeville had privacy and confidentiality. So there would be quite a considerable number of people coming from Northern Ireland in the context of the peace process," he said.
Mr Haughey said the understanding always was that the party leader's allowance was made available to him to dispense with at his sole discretion.
"It was always understood that insofar as my relationship with that fund was concerned that there would be a balance struck, that Eileen Foy would take a note of anything that she undertook on my behalf which were strictly personal and not for party purposes," he said.
"I would either owe the party leader's account money or it would owe me money and that was the way that the balance would be struck," he said. It was done in a broad way. Mr Haughey was asked about sums paid to the Coq Hardi restaurant. He said they often used the restaurant in those days to entertain.
Asked about payments to Charvet, the shop in Paris, Mr Haughey replied: "That has attracted a great deal of attention and gone into folklore, but it was not as important as it is made out to be." He said he didn't have a bank account and could not get French francs, so Ms Butler made arrangements for him to get them.
Asked about Celtic Helicopters, Mr Haughey said the tribunal was attaching a great deal of importance to it. After he left public office in 1992, he was free to take whatever paternal interest he wanted.
"I feel it would be totally invidious if I were to be singled out for looking paternally at the affairs of a small fledgling aviation company in which we had a family interest. I think the whole thing is absurd, to be honest. I know very well that Celtic Helicopters would never have figured in any tribunals or anything else, were it not for the fact that Ciaran Haughey is my son . . . where he is pilloried in newspapers, himself and his partner, day after day, week after week, for no other reason than that he is a son of mine.
"I feel perfectly entitled to resent the way one unfortunate little aviation company, doing their best, and providing a very good service to the tourist industry, is dragged before a tribunal the way they have been," Mr Haughey stated.