He was referring to the media's pursuit of a story concerning a politician being in receipt of a large sum of money for which he had offered explanations that were less than credible.

Ahern's comments on 7 October 1997 were in response to the resignation of Ray Burke from the Dail. Over the previous months, Burke had been pursued about �30,000 he received in 1989. Evidence dribbled out at various stages suggested the payment was connected to an attempt to rezone land in north Co Dublin.

In the end, the planning tribunal was established to investigate his finances, exactly 10 years ago this month.

Within weeks of that, Burke resigned.

One unturned stone led to another. Burke was exposed as a kept man, far from innocent, who had hounded away numerous inquiries into his finances over the previous 30 years. In 2005, he was jailed for tax evasion. Ahern's "sinister development" turned out to be dogged journalism in the best traditions of public service.

Burke's case opened the planning tribunal era. Now, exactly a decade on, the case of Bertie Ahern's finances is bookending that era.

Next Thursday His appearance before the tribunal next Thursday is unlikely to cast further light on the �177,000 that went through his accounts in the mid '90s.

What is remarkable in examining the two cases is that the more things change, the more they stay the same. A decade of uncovering corruption appears to have done little for ethical standards in public life.

The Ahern case would suggest that one area that has been enhanced beyond all recognition is the business of spin. His receipt of what conservatively equates to 500,000 in today's money has been cast as a dig out of a few bob from friends when he was down on his uppers.

There is absolutely no reason to believe that Ahern was a kept man in politics, as Burke turned out to be. There are, however, as many questions about the �177,000 he received in bank accounts in 1994-'95 as there were about the �30,000 that came to light about Burke a few years later.

Burke kept coming out with different excuses, different versions about the 30 grand Michael Bailey handed to him during the election campaign of 1989.

Ahern's story about his finances simply doesn't stack up. He has given at least two different versions to the tribunal, omitting any mention of the receipt of a briefcase containing stg�30,000 from his first account. He has given three different versions to the public. In dealing with both the tribunal and the public, his story has changed each time a new piece of evidence landed in the respective domains.

His answers don't tally with the records of AIB. He says stg�30,000 was deposited in December 1994, yet the records suggest it was $45,000.

Explaining other sterling deposits in 1995, he says he withdrew money, changed it to sterling and relodged it in his bank. The bank shows no sterling transactions of that magnitude in the time in question.

There is more. In October 1994 he made a lodgement he says consisted of a �16,500 loan from friends in Dublin, and stg�8,000 from strangers at a whipround in Manchester.

The bank records suggest the lodgement equated to exactly Stg�25,000, indicating a single lodgement to that value. Ahern has offered scant evidence that Manchester happened at all . . .

and the tribunal has uncovered very little to support the event as outlined by the Taoiseach.

The inquiry has already heard of briefcases of cash being ferried between Ahern's constituency office and AIB O'Connell Street. On one occasion, an official from the bank was summoned to Drumcondra to collect a bag of money.

Receipts designed to show where the 30 grand from December 1994 was spent were put into the public domain during the election campaign. Among them is a receipt for �3,000 from All Seasons Conservatories on 4 July 1994, six months before Ahern received the bag of cash.

Muddying the waters, complicating simple concepts, appears to be a key strategy in this affair. Everywhere in his story there are holes, yet nearly one year on from the first revelations, he sails stronger than ever before.

Timing is crucial. Poor Ray Burke was unmasked at a remarkable time. A few months previously, details of Charlie Haughey's finances had emerged. There was a public appetite to discover who exactly had been on the take over the years. On 2 September 1997, Ahern told the Dail the public required "an absolute guarantee of the financial probity and integrity of their elected representatives and to know they were not under financial obligations to anybody". It would be nine years before we knew even an outline of the huge sums Ahern himself had received.

Rambo's fate The opposition in 1997 were also gung-ho to clean up politics. Rambo was buried under a mountain of righteous indignation. The timing was much kinder to Ahern. Fast-forward from 1997 to last September.

Nine years of revelations about politicians on the make have taken their toll. Corruption fatigue is setting in among the public. Ahern is a popular politician who has led the country during an economic boom.

Throw in his brilliantly tearful interview with Bryan Dobson and people preferred to look away. The opposition were cowed by opinion polls which indicated there was little appetite from the public to probe further.

The revelations last September came at a time when the stock of the tribunal was at an all-time low. Nine years after its establishment, the planning tribunal had become a byword for waste and exorbitant legal fees. Despite the good work it had accomplished over the years, it had fallen into disrepute in the public mind.

The legal fees were the main problem. Longevity was another. Years after snaring the likes of Burke, all that seemed to be left in the dank pool of corruption was venal councillors, picking up a few grand here and there for their troubles.

The public had become disconnected from the inquiry.

Some of the criticism was justified. Lawyers were being paid to do work that would have been more efficiently undertaken by forensic accountants.

Scant regard was paid to the difficulties the tribunal had encountered in getting powerful interests . . . including the two main political parties . . . to cooperate fully.

Spin galore In such an environment, spin thrived. A succession of ministers decried the leaks, blaming the tribunal directly, despite a complete lack of evidence. The leaks became the story.

Back in '97, the song was the same. The final straw for Burke was a leaked document that suggested he had sold passports. A report in the Irish Times in the week after he resigned gauged the political mood in Burke's party. "The issue, as far as Fianna Fail people were concerned, was who had leaked the passport story to the Irish Times. . .

"Not one Fianna Fail figure seems to have referred to the fact that Mr Ray Burke received �30,000 from a developer, and that there was a level of public concern about this."

The leak, not the money, was the story. Some in the media bought the spin this time around. Writing in the Sunday Independent last May, Eoghan Harris said he was going to vote for Fianna Fail for the first time in his life.

"And if you care about the future of Irish democracy, you will do the same. Because I believe the anti-Ahern campaign to be the most sinister, sustained and successful manipulation of the Irish media that I have ever seen in my lifetime, " he wrote. Ignore the evidence, observe the dark forces at work, hounding an innocent man.

On the Friday before polling day, Harris gave an impassioned performance on the same theme on The Late Late Show.

It was regarded as a significant contribution to the election debate. Ahern appointed Harris to the new senate in August. Most worryingly, the heir apparent, Brian Cowen, continues to carry the baton.

Speaking at the Humbert Summer School recently, he said no person should have to go through what Bertie Ahern endured when details of his finances were leaked prior to the election.

"They know him pretty well by now and they understand that he is not motivated by personal gain, " Cowen said.

The leaks, not the dodgy explanations about �177,000, is the story. Ignore the evidence, sure doesn't everybody know Bertie is a sound fella.

It's deja vu all over again after a decade of stone-turning. Fianna Fail appears more interested in protecting its own than observing standards in public life. The opposition and government partners have been cowed by the Taoiseach's popularity. The media is apparently either stupid or in thrall to dark forces.

That is where we are at as a democracy. To borrow a phrase from Ahern himself, the pre-eminence of this spin over substance amounts to a "sinister development".