In December 1994, Ahern deposited �50,000 in an account opened by Celia Larkin. She opened a second account to take the stg�30,000 Micheal Wall generously brought over from England for the house.

The 50 big ones were for Larkin to spend on refurbishments to the house Ahern was going to rent from Wall, even though Wall hadn't bought it yet.

In January, according to Larkin, Ahern drove her to the AIB branch in O'Connell Street. She withdrew the money without counting it.

Ahern deposited the cash in St Luke's, in his "safe safe", as he called it on Thursday. The first time he informed the tribunal about this money was in a second report compiled by accountant Des Peelo earlier this year.

In reply to judge Mary Faherty, the Taoiseach offered the following explanation for the withdrawal: "My view is either I just wanted to have it in cash and just deal with the bills in cash, I'm comfortable to do this."

Then he added another explanation. "What I needed to do was give Celia Larkin money." This explanation suggests it would have been easier for Larkin to buy stuff for the house if she had cash rather than issuing cheques. But at one stage, Larkin had to take out a loan of �3,000 for items because she didn't have access to the money. Ahern then reimbursed her from the stash in his "safe safe".

The third, "polar opposite" reason, according to Faherty, was that he wasn't going to bother with the house at all: "I did think at one stage why bother renting a house, a house that at the time had its own problems and difficulties because of its location." Neither Larkin nor Wall gave any evidence that Ahern was at one stage thinking of backing out of the deal.

Ahern says the lodgements of stg�10,000 and stg�20,000 in June and December came from the �50,000 in his safe. Until last week, he said he bought the sterling in early 1995 himself, but he has no specific memory of it. On Thursday, he changed this version. "I could have done it in instalments, or in different banks or got somebody else to do it, " he said.

It would be safe to assume a political associate or civil servant would remember being asked by a Fianna Fail leader to bring a bag of cash to the bank to purchase stg�30,000. If you're out there, please contact the planning tribunal.