The total cost of the Moriarty tribunal up until the end of May this year is €39.57 million, Taoiseach Brian Cowen has said.
Mr Cowen told an Oireachtas Joint Committee on Finance today the overall cost of the tribunal cannot be estimated with any accuracy until third party costs are estimated.
But he added any attempts to quantify third part costs could lead to “conclusions being drawn and suppositions being made which infringe on the rights of witnesses and impinge on the independence of the tribunal.”
He said he is hopeful the tribunal could complete its work by the end of the year.
In response to questions from Fine Gael’s Kieran O’Donnell and Labour’s Joan Burton, the Taoiseach said he would be available to appear again before the Committee to discuss the banking crisis.
And he said he would be happy to furnish the Committee with all relevant documents on the matter from his department.
“We don’t have a plethora of documents…anything that is available to the department of the Taoiseach that will be of help we can provide,” he said.