THIS was at bottom a very simple case, Mr James Price QC, counsel for the Sunday Times - told the jury in his summing up of the Reynolds libel hearing in the High Court in London yesterday.
Mr Reynolds is suing the newspaper for an article published in its British edition of November 20th, 1994, under the heading "Goodbye, Gombeen Man". It said "how a fib too far proved fatal for Ireland's peacemaker and Mr Fixit".
These words were at the heart of the case, said Mr Price, "the heart and sense of it. He did not tell the whole truth to the Dail and his coalition partners".
The Sunday Times is denying libel, pleading justification and qualified privilege.
Mr Reynolds had objected to the words "Spring had opted instead for a deal with the devil", said Mr Price, but his objection "may have been somewhat blunted" by the fact that the same term was used by his friend, Mr Scan Duignan, to describe the amazement of the electorate about Labour going into coalition with Fianna Fail after what they had said about that party.
He drew the jury's attention to a section in the article which quoted from an Irish Times editorial, describing Mr Reynolds as "a political bully behind a smiling face who showed a cynical indifference to those principles of public office which did not suit his purposes
Public life will not be greatly the poorer for his departure from office." These words were not complained of, he said.
The phrase in the article "the deal was all based on a lie" came from one of Mr Spring's colleagues, not identified as Mr Fergus Finlay, he said.
The heart of the article was "Mr Reynolds went a fib too far", he said. All the rest was "froth, frills' and political comment".
If that central core of the article was true, that Mr Reynolds did mislead his partners in government and the Dail, then the defendant was entitled to succeed in this action.
"Can I try and cut through the smokescreen that is puffed out by politicians when they are caught out in murky business?" he asked.
"Two years ago, Fianna Fail was caught out in murky business and started puffing out a smokescreen. There are two facts that Mr Reynolds cannot get away from.
"One: the entire focus was what does Mr Reynolds's speech on Tuesday have to contain to satisfy Mr Spring, and two: on that Monday Mr Reynolds knew enough to form the view that Mr Whelehan should not be sworn in as President of the High Court."
Yet, he continued, in his speech on Tuesday Mr Reynolds had said to the Dail: "There is nothing to say he is not as suitable today for high office as he was a few weeks ago. . . Neither has anyone expressed doubts about the competence, propriety or integrity of this man.
Is this supposed to be true?" asked Mr Price. "The whole presentation of this speech was to assure the Dail that it was being given all the facts," he continued. "Mr Reynolds had said: `I am giving the House all the information I have on this matter.' He knew perfectly well that this was not true. It was a flat lie."
Mr Reynolds had said he could not impugn Mr Whelehan's integrity on the Tuesday on the basis of "incomplete information". This was "another excuse for a lie".
"He didn't have to show Mr Whelehan a red or yellow card but he did not have to give him such a ringing endorsement," he said.
And if he felt he could not tell the Dail about the Duggan letter because his information was incomplete, there was no reason why the deputy prime minister could not have been told the whole story.
Mr Reynolds's objective that day was to "coax the Labour Party back into government". If the Labour ministers considered themselves misled they would not go.
"What caused the change on Wednesday? Mr Reynolds says a letter from the attorney general. This letter has become a life raft for Mr Reynolds. It has become an excuse for throwing the unfortunate Mr Whelehan to the wolves."
But there was nothing in this letter to justify the change, he said. It said it would be quite wrong to tell the Dail that this was the first time the legal issues in the Smyth case had come up. But Mr Reynolds already knew that on Monday. It also told him about the truthfulness of Mr Whelehan's explanation for the delay in the extradition of Father Smyth.
"The answer is that it was the price Labour demanded to come back into government and save Mr Reynolds's skin."
Mr Spring then discovered that Mr Reynolds had the information on the Monday and told Mr Reynolds he could no longer support him. "That, in a nutshell, is the case, said Mr Price.