Madam, - Enda Kenny's "assessment" of the Taoiseach's testimony to the Mahon tribunal is tantamount to eroding the very institutions which define Ireland as an democracy.
A motion of no confidence in Bertie Ahern is a motion of no confidence in the capacity of the judges of the Mahon tribunal to assess Mr Ahern's statements. Is it Mr Kenny's opinion that the judiciary is no longer competent nor qualified to assess any evidence put before it, so that he, as Fine Gael leader, must don Judge Mahon's hat and make the assessment of the Taoiseach's evidence in lieu of the tribunal? - Yours, etc,
BOBBY PRINGLE, Drumcondra, Dublin 9.
Madam, - Jake Walsh (September 26th) might be more tolerant of Mr Ahern's "garbled syntax and structureless ramblings" if he accepted that it has, in fact, a purpose.
Language, as John Humphrys reminded us in Lost for Words, is power; and the first sign that power is being abused may be the misuse of language: "If a politician, a business leader, a pressure group. . .is not using straightforward language that most of us can understand, we should smell a rat." - Yours, etc,
PHIL MORTELL, Ennis Road, Limerick.
Madam, - Your readers' letters show extreme bias against Mr Ahern. Or perhaps it is that the majority of your readers are those who are more prosperous.
Are we going to have to read these accusatory letters until the tribunal's final report? How very, very boring. I shall skip them. - Yours, etc,
JOAN HICKEY, Lower Kilmacud, Dublin 14.
Madam, - What a coincidence that all Mr Ahern's ministerial colleagues believe he has done nothing wrong, and all Opposition frontbenchers believe he has. - Yours, etc,
PATRICK SEMPLE, Richmond Park, Monkstown, Co Dublin.
Madam, - It is sickening to listen to Fianna Fáil Ministers on radio and TV seeking to justify the payments to Bertie Ahern while he was minister for finance in the early 1990s.
At that time I also went through a marriage break-up without the salary and perks of a serving minister and managed to arrange matters through bank services, without so-called "dig-outs".
It's quite pathetic to hear the rehearsed mantra from Government Ministers exploiting public sympathy by citing Mr Ahern's marriage break-up. Most disturbing is to hear the Minister currently in charge of the education system for our young people endorsing this very questionable behaviour.
Are these the values the public are willing to accept in politics, or is it just a Fianna Fáil failing? - Yours, etc,
PATRICK BURKE, Clontarf Road, Dublin 3.
Madam, - Your edition of September 25th reports that Bertie Ahern agreed "that AIB records must be incorrect if his account of a lodgment he made in December 1994 is correct".
My instinct tells me I should have more faith in the records of Allied Irish Banks than in the varying stories recounted by the "most devious" one. - Yours, etc,
IAN KAVANAGH, Suir Road, Dublin 8.
Madam, - So if AIB's records are correct that it dealt in only £1,921.55 in sterling on December 5th, 1994, the Taoiseach cannot be correct when he says he lodged £30,000 belonging to Michael Wall on that day.
Well, AIB are the bank, so they must be correct. Surely we can implicitly trust the records of an organisation that at the time was paying interest without deducting DIRT to bogus non-residents, that in 2001 discovered it had lost $692 million from foreign currency trading, and that in 2004 admitted overcharging on foreign exchange dealings to the tune of approximately €25 million. - Yours, etc,
N. HEFFERNAN, Dublin 20.
A chara, - Let us hope that Bertie Ahern does not revert to his previous profession of accountancy when his term as Taoiseach ends. - Is mise,
SINÉAD NÍ DHONNCHADHA, Islandbridge, Dublin 8.