Elaine Byrne: A decade on from Moriarty, what have we really learned from it all?

Even though the CAB continues to examine the tribunal’s findings, Judge Moriarty did the state some service as his reports changed the law, informed policy and prompted a cultural change

Michael Lowry and Denis O’Brien at the launch of Esat Digifone in Dublin in March 1997: the granting of the mobile phone licence to O’Brien was later examined by the Moriarty Tribunal. Picture: Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland

The tenth anniversary of the publication of the second and final Moriarty Tribunal report falls tomorrow. Was it worth all the fuss?

The tribunal was established in 1997, and its first report, in which it examined payments to Charles Haughey, was published in December 2006 (six months after Haughey’s death).

The former Fianna Fáil taoiseach received at least £9 million in donations between 1979 and 1996, which the tribunal calculated as €45 million in contemporary ...