Extracts from an interview given by the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, on RTE television's Prime Time, broadcast last night:
Brian Farrell: Taoiseach, how badly rattled is the Government by what has been happening over the last couple of days?
The Taoiseach: Well, I don't think the Government is rattled at all about issues which really were the subject of the tribunal. I think it has just been run and run again in the media and it is, I think, the Government's obligation to say something about these matters. I think we've been dealing with them all in the tribunal all along. I have all the time said that the Government, the Fianna Fail party, myself, would deal fully and comprehensively with any issue to do with the tribunal. That stands.
As witnesses and allegations that would normally come within the tribunal have come into the media, sometimes then we have to respond to them and that we will do with these issues too.
B.F: But it clearly is the case that you haven't always kept your PD partners informed of what's going on.
Taoiseach: Well, I think we have kept our PD partners well informed on all of these matters. I think we kept them very well informed in terms of some of the issues that happened within Fianna Fail. We tried to respond and deal with the tribunal as best we can.
Issues raised last summer with me that anything that comes in the public domain we should inform the tribunal of, and we have done that. What we did do was keep the tribunal informed and keep the public at large informed.
B.F: But before the Tanaiste could make a considered statement today, she had to go and have an hour-long meeting with you. Now, clearly she was looking for information you hadn't given her.
Taoiseach: Well, the Tanaiste gave a press conference yesterday morning at 11 a.m. and she met me at 5 p.m. so I think that the Tanaiste had made a comprehensive statement in the morning about the matters. We spoke later on in the day about all of the other matters, but I think that the difficulty in this climate is that we set up costly tribunals, we have two of them and many more, and the real issue is: `Are these issues dealt with within the tribunal; where people are called as witnesses, they make statements, they make affidavits, or are they dealt with on the Sunday newspapers?'
Now, we are in the position that sometimes we have to deal with the tribunals where it is not in the public domain and other times, on Sunday morning, you awake to hear that you have to answer things that have jumped up overnight.
B.F: But you're not pretending it's just business as usual. You're not pretending this isn't a distraction from what's going on?
Taoiseach: All these things are distractions. The tribunals themselves are distractions and the sooner the better that the tribunals are allowed to do their work unhindered by all the legal arguments, which I suppose are people's rights, but they certainly delayed it for a long time. I was the one who set up the tribunals, I was involved in legislation through the Dail. I involved the Opposition in them. We have very powerful individuals running them and I hope that they can do their job and that they find all the truth and nothing but the truth. I have no difficulty with that whatsoever.
B.F: Last night, the PDs were saying, as of now, they would continue to support the Government. That was a very conditional statement and that was in circumstance where you could only recollect one meeting with Mr Gilmartin. We now have a situation where you have discovered the other meetings. Have you satisfied them today?
Taoiseach: Well, I don't, I saw headlines this morning about conditionality. I don't interpret it that way. I heard no mention of that in the meeting I had with the Tanaiste or Minister Molloy yesterday, nor did I hear it in meetings today. Certainly, they want to know anything I know and there's no difficulty about that. I keep them informed as best I can. I was asked Sunday evening do I ever remember meeting Mr Gilmartin and I have said several times in the last number of months that I well remember meeting Mr Gilmartin on one occasion. This weekend, when I was asked that he said it was at least three, four, five meetings, whatever, I went to a lot of trouble all day Monday when I could find the people in the Department of Labour, my own office, and the Department of Finance, and my constituency office, to go through every diary and every file that we had for 12 years and I think that, in fantastic efficiency by people in those Departments working until three o'clock in the morning, I was able to make a statement this morning.
B.F: Taoiseach, it's wonderful but we don't know what you were talking about. Why did you have to see him twice within 10 days? I mean, you weren't passing time of day. You know on one occasion, you said it yourself, you were talking about Bachelors Walk development and you were talking about business, you were talking about public policy.
Taoiseach: Well, ministers, Brian, regularly, and it is a good thing in this democracy to meet people; it is a very good idea I think for ministers to meet people and at times they are business people and they are trying to bring forward projects and trying to develop projects and they are trying to move things on. Mr Gilmartin, back in 1988, was talking about spending £500 million in one of the most dilapidated and run down areas of the city, which happened to be in my constituency in Bachelors Walk. I was on the ministerial task force, promoting employment, promoting activity. In my view, if I was not meeting people like Mr Gilmartin, I would not have been doing my job.
B.F: He was trying to get leverage, wasn't he. That's what it was about?
Taoiseach: To the best of my knowledge, what he said himself, and the meeting I can remember, he was looking at a development of spending £500 million and was trying to obviously get support for moving that development on and was subsequently moving another development. And your business people are always doing that.
B.F: Some business people seem to do it more effectively than others; some people seem to rise to the top and they are the people who seem to be paying big money to political parties.
Taoiseach: Well, I would have to say, there are not many people paying big money to political parties in my experience now and there's certainly not many individuals. But it's not a question of money. I have never, and I don't think that anyone in politics should, equate people paying big money to either political parties or to politicians for developments that they want to bring forward. I think what politicians should be doing, and I have done all my life, is use whatever influence that I have or use whatever support I can give to business people, so that they can bring forward developments . . .
B.F: Mr Gilmartin, it is common now, he gave £50,000 to P. Flynn. Did that ever find its way to Fianna Fail?
Taoiseach: No. On our checks, when this came to light last autumn or about September that there was £50,000, we did check our records to see if we got £50,000 from Mr Gilmartin or any of the known companies and the answer is that we didn't.
B.F: Did you inform Mr Gilmartin?
Taoiseach: We had no contacts with Mr Gilmartin other than, at one stage, Mr Gilmartin did go to the Fianna Fail headquarters and made a statement and those statements were conveyed to the tribunal in the appropriate way.
B.F: On the basis of what we now know of these meetings, one would have to regard Gilmartin as somebody who had an in with very senior Fianna Fail people like yourself.
Taoiseach : No, I don't consider . . . the very fact that he met me in my constituency office, Brian, anybody can come into that. It was my Monday morning constituency times. On that particular day, and that he was in my constituency, there were 31 contacts between me and different people, including Mr Gilmartin.
B.F: And you have no recollection of any talk about £50,000 or about money being given to P. Flynn?
Taoiseach: Well, in fairness to Mr Gilmartin, as I understand it, he is saying in his meetings with me that he was purely putting forward developments, his Bachelors Walk site. (Interrupted by Farrell) I think he said later on, that on a subsequent occasion he rang me and raised the matter that he had given £50,000 to P. Flynn.
B.F: But you have no recollection?
Taoiseach: I have no memory whatsoever of that. But if he had said, if he had rang me, and I will be honest with you, if he had rang me and said that he had given a donation to the treasurer of the party, I would necessarily not have remembered that. I think £50,000 is a big sum, I might have remembered that, but for him to say that he could have given a donation to the party or to Mr Flynn who was treasurer of the party, I would have had no reason whatsoever to doubt Mr Flynn in any way (interrupted).
B.F: Have you asked Mr Flynn what happened to the money?
Taoiseach: Umm, the Fianna Fail party some time ago made contact with Mr Flynn and all of those matters, Brian, are in the domain of the tribunal, but the Fianna Fail party . . .
B.F: Very straightforwardly, are you yourself satisfied as leader of the party with the answer you got?
Taoiseach: No.
B.F: And is that one of the reasons why you said on the one hand that Mr Gilmartin didn't really know how many meetings he had with you, so you didn't have to take things so seriously; but on the other hand you felt P. Flynn should make a public statement?
Taoiseach: Well, insofar as Mr Gilmartin, as soon as I checked my records, I found that Mr Gilmartin met me, so I said I would check the records and I did very promptly with the help of civil servants who are no longer working with me and I am very grateful for that. But, on the other side, you are asking me the question: `Did the Fianna Fail party check with Mr Flynn about the donation?' we did and, as I said, those matters are with the tribunal.
B.F: Is that one of the reasons why people close to you were indicating well in advance that for P Flynn, there was no possibility of him being reappointed a Commissioner?
Taoiseach: No. There was nobody close to me or on my authority saying that P. Flynn as Commissioner was going to be the next Commissioner or not. I had given no consideration to that matter and nobody should have been briefing on that matter.
B.F: But given your situation now, you admit you weren't satisfied with his answer. Isn't it straightforward: you're not going to reappoint him?
Taoiseach: Well, Mr Flynn I think has taken the view all along that he is going to answer these matters to the tribunal and that was satisfactory until now. The reason I changed that position yesterday was because there had been so much evidence given by a gentleman who perhaps will not be in the inquiry for several months, that he should say something regarding the matter and I think it would be good if he did.
Later in the interview, Mr Ahern was asked about Mr Burke.
B.F: People have asked repeatedly why it was so important for you in forming your Government to select someone about whom you had doubts; you had sufficient doubts, you had investigations taken. Why was that so very necessary?
Taoiseach: Well, I had checked to the best of my knowledge and to the best of my ability and substantially and, as I said, the full check is with the tribunal. But I had found no reason whatsoever to find any information on Ray Burke. So I was in the position, Brian, although there were allegations; there were newspaper articles; there were people in the street talking about it; my checks, which were substantial checks, and I think in the cold light of day will be seen to be substantial checks as the best that I could do it, were stating that Mr Burke had done nothing. So if I left him out I was declaring him guilty, and if I put him in, of course there was a risk.
B.F: What about the rumour and innuendo that you put him into Government because you couldn't afford not to?
Taoiseach: That is entirely untrue and I wouldn't do that for anyone or to anyone. But neither will I listen to speculation and when I could not find any substantive evidence then act on that. In this case, I had no substantive evidence; Ray Burke was a good minister, a good front bench colleague, an efficient person and I had no evidence other than what he himself had stated - that he had got political donations which he used, them, politically.
B.F: Currently, we have investigations going on about very senior politicians, Mr Haughey, Mr Flynn, Mr Burke; you were close to all of them, you were part of the inner circle in Fianna Fail. Many people find it difficult to understand that if these people were involved in behaviour which was inappropriate to say the least that you didn't know about it.
Taoiseach: Well, the tribunals will ultimately decide how inappropriate their actions were. We know some of the details; they were all cabinet colleagues, I worked with them all, that is a fact. But it is not for me to prejudge any of them or prejudge what will be in the tribunals about them."