The former FF accountant has given evidence at private and public sessions of the planning tribunal about his knowledge of his party's finances in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

"I personally believe they [tribunal lawyers] formed the conclusions before they commenced their work. And if the evidence coming to them in private session wasn't fitting into their predetermined view of things, they didn't want to know. . . they wanted to prove their conclusions before they heard the evidence."

Fleming accepted that his remarks represented "severe criticism" of the work of the planning tribunal. "Maybe the former chairman [Feargas Flood] didn't even know how some of his staff were behaving in private session, " he said.

The comments come after last month's attack on the cost of tribunals led by T�naiste Michael McDowell and indicate a new confidence in government circles in relation to dealings with the decade-long investigations.

Fleming, now a FF TD for Laois-Offaly, said it was "remarkable" that he had given a private statement to the tribunal in 1998 about disgraced former minister Ray Burke but he still had to be asked about the information at a public sitting. "If I'm around in 10 years time they might get around to me, " he said.

Fleming has given evidence at both the Flood/Mahon and the Moriarty tribunals.

Speaking on Vincent Browne's RT� radio programme last week, Fleming said he "found it remarkable that I was able to go into the Moriarty tribunal in private session and meet with a senior counsel and a solicitor.

They'd take notes and we'd do up a statement afterwards.

"You go into the Flood tribunal and they had three senior counsel, two junior counsel, solicitors, two stenographers and a person with a tape recorder, costing the taxpayers Euro20,000 an afternoon just to talk to me. They could have done it for free if they'd let me."

The Fianna F�il TD said the information he gave the planning tribunal was already in the public domain. "I had put it all on the D�il record and they spent Euro20,000 to get me to recite it in private session. God only knows why."