The Mahon tribunal has queried a number of foreign exchange transactions involving the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern in the early 1990s.
The tribunal has told Mr Ahern - during a private interview by tribunal counsel last month - that the Irish pound lodgment made by his then partner Celia Larkin on December 5th, 1994, did not equate to £30,000stg at the exchange rate that operated on the day.
Mr Ahern has acknowledged that Manchester-based businessman Michael Wall gave him £30,000stg in cash during a meeting in his constituency office in St Luke's, Drumcondra, on the weekend before the Monday lodgment.
He told the tribunal Ms Larkin lodged the money to an account in her name at AIB on O'Connell Street, Dublin. The money was used for the renovation of a house being purchased by Mr Wall which Mr Ahern was to rent. It was also used to pay stamp duty. Two years later Mr Ahern bought the house from Mr Wall. It is understood the tribunal has investigated the amount of Irish money lodged and the exchange rate that operated on the day, and put it to Mr Ahern that the amount lodged did not equate to sterling £30,000.
In an interview last month Mr Ahern was told the tribunal had noted that the amount lodged equated to $45,000 at the exchange rate that operated on the day. Mr Ahern stated emphatically that he had never been involved in any dollar transactions.
Last night a spokeswoman for Fianna Fáil told The Irish Times that the Taoiseach's position "is that he was not involved in any dollar lodgment".
The tribunal also asked Mr Ahern about a lodgment made in October 1994. The tribunal was told this lodgment included £16,500 given to him as a "dig-out" by four friends, as well as approximately £8,000stg he had been given on a trip to Manchester at around that time.
The tribunal examined the amount lodged and the exchange rates that applied on the day, and found that the total amount lodged equated to £25,000stg.
It also found that the part of the lodgment that was said to have come from Manchester did not equate to a clean sterling amount, given the exchange rate that operated on the day.
Mr Ahern told the tribunal it was not the case the total was a sterling lodgment. Last night his spokeswoman said that "in relation to the lodgment of about £24,000, the Taoiseach's position is that was a lodgment of a combination of Irish pounds and sterling as the Taoiseach has previously described".
He told the tribunal that lodgments in June and December 1995 were sterling lodgments. The tribunal had already noted through its own work that these lodgments equated to the equivalents on the days in question of £10,000stg and £20,000stg. The tribunal told Mr Ahern that it had not been informed, prior to last month, that the two lodgments had been immediately preceded by foreign exchange transactions.
Mr Ahern explained to the tribunal how he came to lodge the two sterling amounts. He said he had withdrawn £50,000 from the bank in January 1994 and converted much of it into sterling as he intended giving the money to Mr Wall for work on the Drumcondra house Mr Wall was purchasing.
However, in the event he had not given the money to Mr Wall and had kept it in a safe in St Luke's. Some of the money was spent on the Drumcondra house, and the rest lodged back to the bank in the July and December lodgments, he said.
The Fianna Fáil spokeswoman last night said Mr Ahern's position in relation to these matters "is as previously stated. He believes the tribunal is the appropriate forum to deal with the detail of these matters".
