The mayor of Tralee, Cllr Norma Foley, a Fianna Fáil general election candidate in Kerry North, yesterday defended sending a family Christmas card in freepost official Oireachtas envelopes to friends and supporters.
However, a spokesman at Fianna Fáil headquarters said it was looking into the matter and was treating it "very seriously".
The Oireachtas envelopes were legitimately given to her father, the former Kerry North TD Denis Foley, and were left over from his time as a TD, Ms Foley said. He had not been given any envelopes since his retirement four years ago.
The card was not just from herself and her husband, it was also "from Denis" and her mother Hanna, she stressed. She assumed he was entitled to continue using those envelopes.
"It would be my understanding that it is custom and practice for retired TDs and Oireachtas members to use these envelopes. The cards did not specifically come in my name, but in Denis's name also," Ms Foley said.
The Oireachtas-stamped envelopes contained a Divine Word Missionaries card with the names of Ms Foley, her husband Denis Maguire, her mother and father printed on them. The cards were hand-signed by Mr Foley.
Ms Foley could not say how many were sent but it was not in the hundreds, she said.
Yesterday, a spokesman at Fianna Fáil party headquarters said the matter was being treated very seriously.
"The party has a very clear line on the use of Oireachtas envelopes by non-serving Oireachtas members. In 2004 the party wrote to all councillors setting out its position, saying it wasn't permitted for non-Oireachtas members to use such envelopes."
A TD for Kerry North until he stepped down at the last general election in 2002, Mr Foley last year paid a total of €580,000 in tax, interest and penalties over a €186,646 liability arising from an Ansbacher account.