Fine Gael TD for Wicklow, Mr Billy Timmins, has welcomed confirmation by the Standards in Public Office Commission that he did not exceed his spending limit during the last General Election .
The initial report from the Commission on the May 2002 campaign, said Mr Timmins had overspent by €2,769. However, the Commission has now accepted that this was due to a clerical error by those providing Mr Timmins's election spending statement.
Following the provision of additional documents by his election agent, the Commission has confirmed that Mr Timmins did not overspend. The Commission has now sent this corrected account to the Oireachtas.
Mr Nicky Kelly, who missed out on a seat by 17 votes in the May 2002 election, was given leave to challenge the Wicklow result in court seven weeks ago.
This followed the initial Commission report which showed that not only Mr Timmins, but also Fianna Fáil's Mr Joe Jacob had overspent during the campaign. Both of these men beat Mr Kelly by some 500 votes, while it was the independent Ms Mildred Fox who won the final seat by just 17 votes.
In his affidavit to the High Court, Mr Kelly said that both Mr Timmins and Mr Jacob had breached the €38,092 election spending limit. The original Commission report said that while Mr Timmins had overspent by €2,769, Mr Jacob did so by some €10,000.
The Commission's acceptance of Mr Timmins's revised account would appear to ensure Mr Timmins is protected from the consequences of any court finding in favour of Mr Kelly. The court would be entitled to order that the election result be overturned, or that the contest be re-run in a constituency, although legal and political observers consider such action highly unlikely.
Mr Timmins said yesterday he was very happy with the outcome.
"Under the legislation I was entitled to spend €38,092.14. In actual fact, I only spent €19,911.19. Included in this, as a result of a Supreme Court decision, was a secretarial salary and office rent of approximately €2,500 which, in reality, involved no expenditure on my behalf."