Smart money on slow yield of Morrogh reports The sentencing this week of Stephen Pearson draws a line under the W&R Morrogh saga.

Or does it? It is now more than two years since the Government set up a number of working groups to look into the collapse of the Cork stockbroker and their reports - which were supposed to take a couple of months - have yet to be published.

There have been reports in recent weeks that Department of Finance officials are putting the finishing touches to one of the reports.

It will deal with how both investors and the stockbroking industry itself can be protected against events like the collapse of Morrogh.

The latest intelligence is that they will go to the Minister in a couple of weeks and a decision will then be taken on whether or not to publish them. What are the odds on Pearson being out on parole before they see the light of day?

 Mannion likely to delay OneWorld departure

There should be some interesting exchanges next month in Dallas, when the various airline bosses from the OneWorld alliance met for their bi-annual jamboree.

Dermot Mannion, the new Aer Lingus chief, is going to use the meeting to declare his scepticism about membership of the group. Also at the table will be Willie Walsh, now running British Airways. The meeting of Mannion and Walsh at this OneWorld meeting is filled with some irony. For example, will Walsh seek to block any plans by his old employers to leave the OneWorld alliance? Not likely, because Willie Walsh himself tried to leave OneWorld last year, but was eventually talked around.

But in a further ironic twist, Walsh won't want Mannion et al to walk right out of the alliance. This is because Aer Lingus provides a steady stream of traffic, via the OneWorld connection, into the British Airways long-haul network at Heathrow. If Mannion and Walsh manage to come to some gentleman's agreement, Mannion isn't out of the woods yet.

Another member of the alliance is American Airlines. American has a long relationship with Aer Lingus and the two companies have spoken about opening 50 US new routes in the event that the Government gets rid of the restrictive bi-lateral agreement. Mannion will not want to cut all ties with American if possible.

So with Walsh watching on and American keen to keep its links, Mannion may have some trouble abandoning his new chums.

Interactive automated telephone answering machines are among the major blights visited on the planet in recent times and Current Account's recent experience with the Revenue's general inquiries line was an illustration in point.

Callers to the line are asked by a disembodied voice to give their PPS number. This Current Account duly did, but half way through the process, a colleague made a casual comment that the Revenue computer managed to hear but did not manage to compute. Start again.

The number was repeated while colleagues were hushed, and this time the computer registered and accepted the number.

Having confirmed that the number was correct, the voice then offered a choice between a further automated process or speaking with a Revenue official.

Current Account chose the second - only to be told that everyone was busy!