IN the 1960s and much of the 1970s party funding was largely partisan, reflecting individual political allegiances.
That applied to business as well as to personal subscriptions, for at that time many companies, including larger ones, were owned privately.
Fianna Fail enjoyed much more business support than Fine Gael or Labour - a phenomenon that still owed a good deal to the party's role in introducing protection for industry in the 1930s.
But this changed in the late 1970s. Businesses became corporations rather than personally run firms.
They developed a less partisan and more constructive approach to politics: increasingly they were open to the concept of supporting the democratic political system as a whole rather than one or other political party.
Thus when I became leader of Fine Gael I found that businesses asked for assistance generally provided funding to Fine Gael as well as to Fianna Fail, broadly proportionate to the parties' public support or Dail membership.
Some firms also contributed smaller sums to Labour.
Although this arrangement meant Fianna Fail continued to be better funded than Fine Gael and, of course, Labour, I welcomed this development.
It seemed to me to offer some protection for the political system against any tendency for such funding to create a sense of party obligation to particular businesses.
On RTE's Saturday View a week ago Matt Cooper, editor of the Sunday Tribune, repeatedly asserted that no one would give money to a political party unless something was expected in return.
While in the midst of the current controversy, concern, even scepticism, about payments to political parties as well as to individual politicians is to be expected, I was disturbed by the extreme cynicism of these insistent assertions.
In my experience between 1977 and 1987 Fine Gael's funding from business was sought and offered as support for the democratic system, free of any strings.
BUT while I was satisfied that this was the case at that time, I could not ignore the possibility of abuse in any such system of private political funding.
Even had I been so simpleminded and naive as to have had illusions on that score, my predecessor in office, Liam Cosgrave, had made sure to mark my card for me.
The one piece of advice he gave me when I succeeded him as party leader was to watch out for any subscriptions the source or the size of which might suggest some favour would be expected or sought in return.
In any such case, he said, I should send the subscription back before even issuing a temporary receipt.
And I recall my annoyance when on one occasion an unsought contribution offered from a source that might have fallen into this category was accepted and a temporary receipt issued - although I managed to have the money returned before that day was out.
The other precaution I took when in government after 1981 was to ensure that ministers would not even be subliminally influenced by subscriptions: subscription sources were not made known to them.
Nevertheless I remained uncomfortable about the whole system for several reasons.
First of all, the heavy dependence of parties on one sector of the community - the business sector - seemed to me to carry with it some risk of politics becoming over oriented to business in general as distinct from any business in particular.
Second, although the vast majority of Irish parliamentarians in all parties in Ireland are absolutely honest, in any group of over 200 people there are liable to be a few exceptions.
And whatever precautions one may take there could always turn out to be some unforeseen loophole such individuals might exploit.
Third, I was aware of reports of local corruption in relation to planning matters where very large sums of money are at stake and where the national party whip which provides a powerful safeguard, is often ineffective.
Some years later, a subsequent government initiated a scheme involving local planning type decisions by central government to designate for tax relief specific areas of towns. This seemed to me to strengthen the case for divorcing national politics from the dangers of corruption that may have infected some local authorities.
And, fourth, as the 1980s wore on, a subtle change was taking place in parts of the Irish business sector.
It seemed, indeed, that some quite ruthless figures were emerging, whose ethical standards bore no relationship to those of the business class as a whole, and who might be tempted to try to buy" some politicians.
It was against that background that five years ago, when I was still a Dail backbencher, I presented the Fine Gael front bench with a proposal to substitute State funding of parties for the present unsatisfactory system.
With one or two small amendments, this proposal was immediately adopted and published as part of Fine Gael policy.
Arising from this, legislative proposals along these lines were then prepared by Labour in government with Fianna Fail, which supplemented the legislation on gifts to politicians that Labour had earlier initiated, and the ensuing Bill on political funding was adopted in principle by the present Government at its formation.
CONSTITUTIONAL doubts arising from the Supreme Court's decision on State financing of Government support for a Yes vote in the divorce referendum delayed the enactment of this legislation.
But this hurdle has recently been overcome and legislation for State funding of parties has this week been approved for introduction in the Oireachtas.
As a necessary preliminary to the entry into force of such legislation the parties", have for some time past been getting their financial houses in order, clearing past debts by massive fund raising efforts.
The compromise legislation agreed several years ago between Labour and Fianna Fail, upon which the proposals just announced by the present Government have been partly based, proposes, however, that subscriptions to parties of up to £4,000 be permitted without disclosure, and higher figures on a disclosure basis.
Given recent events, the need to restore public confidence in the political system seems to me to require the actual elimination of business contributions.
Towards that end the State provision needs to be fixed at a level that would adequately fund the working of the political system, thus facilitating a clean break between politics and business.
Any short term public unhappiness with increased public funding would be over whelmingly offset in the longer run by the restoration of confidence in the integrity of our political system.