Coming down with tribunals

There is a coming row over tribunals, once we get a glimpse of the total costs that have mounted and the liability of the State for tens of millions (maybe over a hundred million) of euro of witnesses' costs.

There is a danger that in the heat of this coming controversy, the Government will buckle to the transitory temper of public opinion and scuttle all tribunals, irrespective of what has been achieved and what could be achieved.

Indeed, one of problems with tribunals arises from the temerity of governments in the face of public opinion, yielding to demands for "independent public judicial inquiries" where no such inquiry is warranted. It is for this reason, for instance, that we have the Barr tribunal, inquiring into the killing by gardaí of John Carthy at Abbeylara in April 2000. There was no need for a tribunal to discover what happened there.

A private independent inquiry by a civil servant or even a barrister could have found out all that needed to be found out.

Indeed, don't we know all we need to know already? The gardaí reflexively created a spectacle out of a trivial event, and in that they were aided and abetted by a compliant media. It is implausible that the hype did not lead to the disaster that transpired, as well, of course, as the spectacular incompetence of the gardaí.

The Dunne Inquiry into the unauthorised use of the organs of deceased children is another needless inquiry. There was crassness and incompetence on the part of the hospital authorities in not asking parents for permission to use the organs of their dead children, but what harm was caused? That inquiry already has cost €15 million and is only getting off the ground.

Then there is the Moriarty tribunal. What on earth is that about? Established to find out more about where Charles Haughey got money from and whether he did any favours in return, and to find out whether Michael Lowry got money from people other than Ben Dunne and whether he did any favours in return, what has it found out that we did not know? Yes, Charles Haughey got millions from various people over the years.

But didn't we know that all along? Otherwise, how could he have financed his lavish life-style The only thing we did not know was whether he did any favours in return and we still do not know whether he did any favours in return, that is after seven years of inquiry by the tribunal. My own view is that Charles Haughey did no favours in return, believing it was favour enough to allow these money men to fund his august self.

Neither do we know anything more about Michael Lowry. I cannot understand what point there was in pursuing the mobile phone licence module once it was established that the committee that awarded the licence to Esat was not got at. What does it matter if Denis O'Brien gave Michael Lowry €1 million or €10 million if Michael Lowry had no part in awarding him the phone licence? However, that is not the full story about tribunals.

The Morris tribunal has been slow in getting to the point and only now is the tribunal getting to the core of the issue: the outrageous abuse of the McBrearty family. For some inexplicable reason the McBreartys are not being guaranteed their legal costs and, as a consequence, are not co-operating. This will cause further needless delays. But the issues being inquired into are serious and suggest Garda corruption on a scale not previously imagined.

The planning tribunal is by far the most expensive and by far the most illuminating. But it too has squandered resources. The Century module, which went on for over a year, discovered nothing we did not previously know about. The Gogarty module went on endlessly as well and although it was illuminating, it needn't have taken several years. Ditto the Brennan and McGowan module and, more recently, the first Tom Gilmartin module.

But the planning tribunal is telling us of corruption on a scale also not previously imagined and it should be allowed continue until it completes its work, subject to a caveat.

Further inquiries should tell us how the Quarryvale project got underway at all, for, it seems to me, that is the central issue. It should also be telling us about what Mr Tony O'Reilly's Fitzwilton was doing giving a £30,000 cheque to Ray Burke in June 1989 and then falsifying the accounts of the company to disguise this payment and reclaiming VAT on the payment.

The caveat about the further workings of the planning tribunal relates simply to this factor: the inability of lawyers and judges to manage anything. Lawyers have no experience in running things and they should not be allowed or asked to manage tribunals. Yes, they should be part of a tribunal team but not running it.

So, when the hullabaloo starts, let's examine the point of tribunals, let's agree to resist pressure for "independent public inquiries" into every outrage, and lets have tribunals, when we have them or continue with them, properly managed. But let the planning and Morris tribunals do their job.