Taoiseach Bertie Ahern's tax papers were given to the Mahon tribunal last February after a major battle with the tribunal's lawyers who insisted they had the right to the documentation.
Mr Ahern and his lawyers had strongly objected to the tribunal's order of discovery to get access to his Revenue correspondence, though they did not challenge the order before the High Court.
Mr Ahern's correspondence with Revenue was subsequently circulated, as is required by a Supreme Court judgment in favour of Owen O'Callaghan in 2005, to up to 40 people involved in the Quarryvale chapter of the tribunal's hearings into planning corruption.
Following a weekend of sharp attacks on the tribunal by Mr Ahern, the Labour Party has put down a Dáil motion affirming the Dáil's confidence in the tribunal. Fine Gael, which has first access to private members' time when the Dáil resumes in late January, is likely to put down its own motion.
Under legislation, Mr Ahern and all other elected TDs must produce a tax clearance certificate, or else a statement of application acknowledging that there are outstanding tax issues, to the Standards in Public Office Commission by February 25th.
Mr Ahern will not be in a position to file a tax clearance certificate, and will instead lodge a statement of application - which will fully comply with the terms of the law.
The commission is unlikely to open an investigation into Mr Ahern's 2002 tax clearance certificate unless a formal complaint is made, and while Fine Gael has hinted that it may lodge such a complaint, it has not yet done so.
The commission has long wanted a change to the ethics legislation that would compel an Oireachtas member who first produced a statement of application to file a tax certificate once that became available, but Minister for Finance Brian Cowen has refused to agree to any of the recommendations for change made by the commission.
Last night, government sources privately appeared content that the majority of public debate centred on Mr Ahern's tax files emerging in public, and not on the fact that Mr Ahern's tax affairs are not up to date.
Labour Party deputy leader Joan Burton said it is now essential that the Dáil should declare its confidence in the Mahon tribunal "given the sustained attacks by the Taoiseach and a number of government Ministers".
"It is surely without precedent in any democracy for a head of government and a succession of his Ministers to launch such a sustained attack on an inquiry established by parliament.
"The attacks appear to have been part of a calculated effort to undermine the tribunal and intimidate it from discharging the mandate given to it by the Dáil and Seanad," Ms Burton said.
"When the original disclosures were made about the large sums of money received by the Taoiseach in 1993 and 1994 in circumstances that are still not fully clear, Fianna Fáil Ministers said with one voice that 'all these matters should be left to the tribunal'.
"However, now that they do not like the way in which issues are emerging at the tribunal, they have changed their collective tune and have launched a series of disgraceful attacks on it," Ms Burton said.
