For all its achievements, the planning tribunal may never fully reveal the corruption culture, writes Paul Cullen.
Dabbled in bribery, political graft or other forms of corruption recently? Afraid of getting caught?
Don't worry, the already slight chance of that happening just diminished further now that the Government has decided to change the terms of reference of the planning tribunal.
The inquiry has been investigating planning corruption since 1997. Under almost every stone it lifted it found corruption. Yet five years passed in the investigation of a single person - Ray Burke - and the inquiry is hopelessly behind schedule.
It has been clear for some time that the tribunal suffers from grave structural problems. It moves too slowly. It costs too much. Its remit is too broad. Its work practices are dated and inefficient. Its life expectancy could be anywhere from another 10 to 30 years. For all its achievements, it is in need of reform.
Now the tribunal judges, with the acquiescence of Government, propose to wind up some investigations and not even begin others. They will also refuse to accept new business, in the form of fresh allegations.
The inevitable result is that large swathes of alleged wrongdoing will not be investigated in public. For all the money and time lavished on the inquiry, it may never get to the bottom of the culture of corruption that afflicted parts of Irish society over three decades.
And how fortuitous that the date now given for the completion of the tribunal's work - March 2007 - just about coincides with the time when a drastic cut in lawyers' fees is due to take effect. The much-vaunted move of former finance minister Charlie McCreevy against barristers' fees will have no effect at the planning tribunal, where senior counsels will continue to collect €2,400 a day for most of their remaining time in the job.
The proposal to split the tribunal into three separate inquiries is welcome, but why wasn't this done from the time new judges were appointed to sit with Mr Justice Feargus Flood two years ago?
It may well be, as the tribunal judges assert, that the tribunal is currently required to investigate every matter brought before it. But why, then, is its official title "the tribunal of inquiry into certain planning matters and payments"?
In June, the tribunal chairman, Judge Alan Mahon, set out a wide range of circumstances in which, he proposed, the tribunal could wind up or abandon investigations. However, the tribunal might never have investigated anything if these criteria had been applied from the start.
For example, Judge Mahon referred to situations involving an elderly witness (James Gogarty or George Redmond fell into this category), a sick witness (for example Joseph Murphy snr) and investigations that might take too long (the first three modules into Mr Burke took five years).
The chairman has sought, and appears to have been given, wide discretion in deciding what to investigate and what to bury. In deciding whether to proceed with an investigation, the tribunal will now be able to take into consideration factors such as the level of corruption involved, the likely duration of any investigation and the likelihood of a clear result.
Clearly, the latter two factors depend to some extent on the resources devoted to a particular investigation.
If the tribunal does decide not to proceed with certain investigations, it's likely for the sake of the good name of those involved that the rest of us will never learn what allegations were involved and what evidence was gathered. The suspicion that matters are being swept under the carpet will linger, perhaps unfairly.
Mr Burke received three large payments in May/June 1989 but only two of these have been investigated in public.
Five years ago, tribunal lawyers said the third payment, a £30,000 cheque he received from Rennicks Manufacturing on behalf of Fitzwilton, would be the subject of public hearings; nothing has been heard on the matter since. Journalists who have been waiting for a tribunal appearance by Sir Anthony O'Reilly in relation to this matter will have to continue waiting.
Frank Dunlop is the tribunal's main whistleblower but many of the hearings into his allegations are repetitive, since a broadly similar set of characters is involved in each case.
Nothing has been heard, meanwhile, about planning controversies in Galway, Cork and other cities. Indeed, it is notable that a tribunal set up to investigate planning corruption has so far only investigated allegations in a single county.
When pleading last June for extra staff, Judge Mahon described the tribunal as being "stretched to its limits, if not beyond". Yet the tribunal sat for three days last week and will manage just two full days this week.
Current hearings into the ownership of Jackson Way are slow-moving, behind schedule and, in the view of most observers, pointless; months of hearings have added little to the store of knowledge built up by journalists some years ago.
The mammoth inquiry into Quarryvale, due to start next year, will take years, not the predicted months.
A set of inter-related investigations into Liam Lawlor's land dealings around Lucan will also take years. Even these estimates don't take account of delays caused by litigation, which is never far away where the tribunal is concerned.
All of this doesn't leave much time for any other investigations, unless existing inquiries are dropped.
All of this shows that only a fraction of the tribunal's workload will see the light of day at public hearings.
In that light, and given the Government's quiet shelving of an earlier commitment to set up a corruption assets bureau, the present changes should be viewed as a device to end the public investigation of corruption in Irish life. How convenient, too, that they will take effect just before the next general election.