The chairman of the public accounts committee came under no pressure to oppose a Coalition Government measure in 1983 to deal with non-resident accounts.
Speaking during a break in the DIRT inquiry, Mr Jim Mitchell, a Minister in that government, said he recalled being "very strongly in support" of the proposal to require depositors to sign an affidavit swearing non-residence.
The DIRT inquiry was told on Tuesday that Fine Gael backbenchers opposed the measure in the Bill, introduced by the then Minister for Finance, Mr Alan Dukes. The Public Accounts Committee was also told a former Labour TD, Mr Barry Desmond, had said the party which brought in full disclosure for banks would probably lose 10 seats in the following general election.
Mr Mitchell said: "I was certainly not conscious personally of any pressure to change it." He was, however, non-committal about whether the committee would be calling Mr Dukes as a witness.
"That is a matter for the committee to decide," he said. It was an issue for consideration.
Earlier, the governor of the Central Bank, Mr Maurice O'Connell, told the inquiry that as someone who was initially opposed to the DIRT tax, he viewed it as a "genuine, worthwhile change and it established a level paying field for the credit institutions". It also, he said, "created an environment in the longer term for an effective and equitable means of tax collection".
He was questioned persistently by Mr Pat Rabbitte about banking competition and the Central Bank's role in monitoring this. He was asked about a letter in 1985 from the Midland & Western Building Society saying that exchange-control regulations were being flouted "on a fairly massive scale by an appreciable number of clearing bank branch managers".
The letter stated that "substantial sums of money are being transferred into external Irish pound accounts and English addresses are literally being supplied to order". The building societies could not compete effectively with the banks because of this "totally illegal activity by what should be the most reliable institutions in the country".
Mr O'Connell said the letter was referred to the Minister for Finance. It was not a matter for the Central Bank.
He also told the inquiry that it was a serious misunderstanding to suggest there was a direct trade-off between "protecting the exchange rate and turning a blind eye to DIRT tax evasion". "There was no such trade-off. Tax was just one of many problems and DIRT was just one of many tax problems, he said.