"Never concede defeat" was Mr Liam Lawlor's only comment yesterday after another bruising courtroom defeat in the long battle to ward off investigations into his affairs.
Mr Justice Thomas Smyth's refusal to agree to Mr Lawlor's call for him to step aside was delivered in unambiguous terms that demonstrated just how thin the West Dublin TD's case was. Crucially, too, the judge revealed that he had consulted the President of the High Court, Mr Justice Morris, before deciding to proceed with the case.
Why, argued the judge, should he step aside from the case because of a single legal opinion he wrote a decade ago. Mr Lawlor claims that this opinion, written for a property company in competition with another developer for whom Mr Lawlor worked, could give rise to an "apparent bias" in the case.
However, Mr Justice Smyth said he could not recollect writing the opinion. Even now, he can't recollect it. He did not know what use was made of it. The opinion said nothing about the specific matters before the court. If he had been aware of it, he would have had no difficulty in bringing it to the attention of the lawyers for Mr Lawlor and the Flood tribunal.
There was no question, therefore, of the judge feeling compromised in the case, in which Mr Lawlor faces jail if the court finds he did not co-operate with the tribunal. "I am not embarrassed and I will do my duty," Mr Justice Smyth declared.
The main precedent cited by Mr Lawlor's lawyers was a longrunning case involving the mining company, Bula. This company sought a rehearing of its case about a mine in Co Meath because there was a "reasonable apprehension of bias" arising from 14 alleged links between two Supreme Court judges hearing the case and other parties.
The problem for Mr Lawlor is that the Supreme Court rejected this claim last July. The fact that a judge acted for or gave advice to a particular party while working as a barrister was not sufficient to disqualify that judge from hearing a case in which that party was involved.
So what will Mr Lawlor do now? He could appeal Mr Justice Smyth's decision, but the prospects of victory in the Supreme Court seem slim. The tribunal's case to force Mr Lawlor to co-operate is now under way and the threat of jail is looming.
His lawyers are making great play of the TD's "change of heart" and his new-found willingness to co-operate. Mr John Rogers SC, for Mr Lawlor, even conceded that his client had been "recalcitrant" at times in the tribunal witness-box and now regretted this.
Mr Lawlor is promising to draw up a "definitive" affidavit of discovery and intends to send large quantities of documents to the tribunal. But as Mr Justice Smyth pointed out, his lawyers not only wanted the judge removed from the case, they also want his orders for Mr Lawlor to produce documents and give evidence to the tribunal vacated.
Mr Justice Smyth said he was unable to reconcile those two positions. As Mr Frank Clarke SC, for the tribunal, pointed out, if Mr Lawlor was now trying to make things right, this was a "very belated conversion". The fact that he was offering to provide more material only showed how little the original court order had been complied with.
While Mr Lawlor's legal team talked of "reconciliation", Mr Clarke listed dozens of ways in which the TD had failed to supply the information sought by the tribunal. His attack is likely to continue when the case resumes today.