Legal costs:The legal costs that could be charged against the estate of the late Charles Haughey could be equal to a significant proportion of the estate or even exceed its value.
The Moriarty tribunal in its report on Mr Haughey has found that he misled it in relation to his knowledge of his financial affairs.
It did not accept Mr Haughey's evidence that all aspects of his personal financial affairs were handled by the late Des Traynor and that the details were not known by Mr Haughey.
As a consequence of Mr Haughey's attitude towards the tribunal, it had to follow complicated money trails to try to identify as many of Mr Haughey's donors over the years as it could.
This led to the tribunal, and a number of other parties, such as banks, having to incur significant, mainly legal, costs.
The tribunal chairman, Mr Justice Michael Moriarty, also said in his report that it would have been published earlier had it not been for correspondence between Mr Haughey's solicitors and the tribunal totalling about 590 items.
In the wake of the 1997 McCracken tribunal the law was changed to allow tribunals deny legal costs to parties that obstructed the work of the tribunal. It also allows tribunals assign a percentage of their costs to such parties.
The Moriarty tribunal incurred costs of €25.23 million up to September of this year. That figure does not include costs of parties that appeared before it.
Mr Haughey sold Abbeville and some of the surrounding lands for €35 million in 2003. He used his portion of the funds to fund a €5 million tax bill.
The income from the sale was divided between Mr and Mrs Haughey and at least some of their children, and how much remains in Mr Haughey's estate is not clear.
