The Labour politician was offering a headline for a potential column to be written by O'Dea. Fine Gael's Michael Ring had prompted the suggestion. "We will read about it [the altercation] in another Sunday exclusive, " Ring dryly remarked.

The two opposition deputies were taking a pop not just at the Fianna Fail minister but also at the Sunday Independent. The newspaper has in recent times published numerous exclusive frontpage stories arising from interviews with . . . and articles written by . . . senior Fianna Fail politicians.

O'Dea has a long-established relationship with the Sunday Independent but Bertie Ahern, in particular, has used the newspaper to make pronouncements about his tribunal difficulties, among other matters.

Indeed, as far as Ahern's media management goes, not since the heyday of Fianna Fail's editorial control over the Press Newspaper Group has a politician or a party been so closely aligned with an individual national newspaper.

The closeness of the Ahern-Sunday Independent relationship was never more obvious than on 29 April last. In that edition of the newspaper, editor Aengus Fanning was in a position to exclusively write: "He [Ahern] will go to the President today to dissolve the Dail, and fix the date of the election for Thursday, May 24." Fanning was privy to this information before a majority of members of the cabinet. He had interviewed Ahern that weekend.

Since the end of April last, Ahern has penned several articles for the newspaper and given it a number of exclusive interviews. "It all related to my judicial separation, " a headline on 13 May declared after Ahern answered questions from the Sunday Independent. "Taoiseach turns on 'Prophets of Doom'", another frontpage exclusive from Ahern was headlined on 1 July. The Fianna Fail leader returned to his personal life last weekend with another article for the newspaper which was headlined, "Mine was not a perfect life or marriage".

Mark O'Brien . . . a media lecturer at Dublin City University . . . sees the Ahern-Sunday Independent link as having historical associations.

"Speeches from de Valera in particular were sent over to Burgh Quay [Press newspaper offices] and then reproduced word for word. So it's pretty much the same type of relationship."

The opposition parties would support this assessment. Yet alongside Ahern's access to its pages . . .

and several leading columnists who write in his favour . . .

the newspaper also has writers who have regularly penned highly critical analyses of the Fianna Fail leader. Gene Kerrigan and Alan Ruddock, two respected and erudite commentators, are among Ahern's most strident critics.

And Ahern's relationship with the Sunday Independent is not unique on several levels, as O'Brien . . . who has written a book on Fianna Fail and the Irish Press . . . explains. "In the past, what would have happened is that politicians owned a newspaper. We saw that with Parnell and also with de Valera. Eamon de Valera established the Irish Press in 1931 to act as a propaganda vehicle for his political party. John Horgan in his 2001 study of the Irish media records writes that, while on a visit to the United States in the 1920s, de Valera paid particular interest in models of newspaper management and ownership. After his political opponent Ernest Blythe made a speech favourable to Ireland's involvement in the British Commonwealth in 1929, de Valera wrote, 'If we had a daily paper at this moment, I believe that Blythe's statement could be used to waken up the nation, but the daily press that we have slurs it over and pretends that nothing vital has been said.'" The media environment has changed dramatically since de Valera wrote those words but the sentiment still very much summarises Fianna Fail's attitude to the media. "Journalists don't understand what we are trying to do, " one senior Fianna Fail figure told me during last May's general election.

To counter the role of the media, Fianna Fail under Bertie Ahern's leadership since 1994 has developed two strong relationships in the Sunday newspaper market, with the Sunday Independent and the News of the World. Both are bestselling papers and both have regularly offered their pages to Ahern and other Fianna Fail politicians. The very nature of their respective objectives . . . newspapers for exclusive stories and politicians for favourable coverage . . . always bring the two sides together. But there are dangers in such relationships as Mark O'Brien argues.

"The media will latch on to a particular politician especially if that politician is popular. This allows them to demonstrate to the politician 'we love you and we will give you fantastic coverage'. But also they can imply that 'if you implement laws against our economic interests, we will turn on you'."

Contacts between newspaper executives and senior politicians are not unique to Ireland but, according to Mark O'Brien, their confidential nature can be a matter of concern and points to a conflict of interest. "They blur the boundaries between the role of the media in keeping an eye on the executive. How can the media be impartial if the top brass of newspapers and politicians are cosying up together? You would have to also question what signal it sends to journalists working on those newspapers. Is there a process of osmosis where they look at what their senior people are doing before writing?"

There is no academic research available to confirm such suspicions. Moreover, by no means . . .as many opposition politicians believe . . . could the Sunday Independent be accused of acting in a Pravda-type role for Fianna Fail or Bertie Ahern.

The Taoiseach's relationship with the Sunday Independent has had its ups and downs. But his links into the pages of the Sunday Independent have given him a strong and politically unique platform to put forward his own viewpoint to the maximum impact.

So when Fianna Fail complains about its treatment by the media, it probably needs to modify its moans. The party, and its current leader in particular, has access not available to its opponents. Both sides currently win from the relationship. But the media is fickle and once Ahern has outworn his usefulness, another will fill his place.