The Standards in Public Office Commission is expected to meet tomorrow to debate if it will open a full investigation into the Minister for Transport, Mr Cullen, and the contracts awarded to Ms Monica Leech in the Office of Public Works and the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government. Mark Hennessy, Political Correspondent, reports.
So far the six members of the commission have not even informally discussed the issue, The Irish Times understands. However, the members have read all the files on the contracts and studied the report produced last week by former leading civil servant Mr Dermot Quigley.
The commission is chaired by High Court judge Mr Justice Matthew P. Smith, and includes Mr John Purcell, Comptroller and Auditor General; Ms Emily O'Reilly, Ombudsman; Mr Kieran Coughlan, Clerk of the Dáil; Ms Deirdre Lane, Clerk of the Seanad, and Mr Liam Kavanagh, former Labour TD and minister.
The commission's decision will be critical for Mr Cullen's ministerial future since there will be calls for him to step aside if it decides to launch a full inquiry.
However, sources close to Mr Cullen have already begun to argue quietly that such a move would be unfair since it would end his ministerial career, regardless of the commission's final verdict.
Fianna Fáil Cork East TD Mr Ned O'Keeffe resigned as minister of state for agriculture in February 2001 after it emerged he had failed to disclose to the Dáil that his family-owned piggery had a licence to use meat and bonemeal.
In the end, the commission ruled that he had inadvertently breached ethics legislation, and the Dáil suspended him for 10 days in 2002.