The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, has been criticised for taking almost 48 hours to explain how his ministerial car was stopped for speeding in Co Kerry last month.
Fine Gael's justice spokesman, Mr Alan Shatter, said it was unacceptable that the Minister had taken so long to explain that his wife and children were in the car at the time. The Minister had initially been "evasive and economical with the truth", he added.
Mr O'Donoghue said on the RTE 5-7 Live radio programme yesterday that he had not been in the car on September 10th. It was being used to take his wife and family, and a family friend, home from a "treat" in Dublin - the All-Ireland hurling final.
Earlier, on Radio Kerry, the Minister had refused to give details of the speeding incident, in which his car was stopped for exceeding 100 m.p.h. in a 60 m.p.h zone outside Castleisland.
Mr O'Donoghue told RTE that he did not condone speeding by himself or anyone else, but the Garda driver of his car, a skilled professional, had told him that he had taken his mind off the driving and "unfortunately exceeded the limit". He did not believe the driver would be charged with any offence.
The Minister said that his car was "only very occasionally" used to bring his wife and children home. Asked if people would wonder whether this was a misuse of a ministerial car, Mr O'Donoghue replied: "Well, it was used on this particular occasion, which was a very rare occasion, for that purpose, and it has been used by other Ministers of all parties in the past in precisely the same way."
The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, said earlier that Ministers, in particular Mr O'Donoghue, knew that they had to live within the law. However, there were occasions when Garda drivers, who were highly trained, had to exceed the speed limit.