It may be the most extraordinary public relations contract ever agreed by a government department. With no obvious public relations experience, Monica Leech, a Waterford businesswoman, was paid a daily rate of €800 plus Vat (almost €1,200), a scale and structure of reward that is rare outside the Four Courts and the tribunals.

All that to duplicate, in part, work being done for the Department of the Environment by other public relations executives.

For weeks, the controversy about Leech’s contract has been fought, largely by way of innuendo, in the press and through parliamentary questions. But last week, in a shock development, Bertie Ahern announced that there would be an independent inquiry into how Leech was hired and why.

Martin Cullen, the former environment minister and Leech’s political mentor, professed himself “delighted” at this development, but in reality he was putting on a brave face. Given his taoiseach’s obvious irritation with the Leech business, there is a real doubt over whether Cullen will survive if the inquiry makes critical findings.

Leech is not answerable to the Standards in Public Office Commission (SIPO), which also makes inquiries, but Cullen is. If the commission is dissatisfied with its examination of the relevant papers of the contracts, the transport minister may have to explain the uncontested nature of Leech’s first six-month contract (nobody else was invited to apply) and will have to justify the scale of pay awarded to an associate.

The real question is this: was Cullen’s long-standing political confidante, with no significant background in media work, really hired as a media consultant or was she actually a political adviser? There is a crucial difference. Political advisers can earn a maximum of €72,000-a-year, and Leech would presumably have been less interested in a post with a pay cap.

If he appointed Leech as a media consultant in order to bypass that cap, Cullen could face the kind of rebuke that would tarnish his political prospects for ever.

IN LATE 2003, four men and a woman filed into a conference room in the Custom House and took seats at the top table. The tender competition for a €5m government electronic voting contract was down to a straight fight between two consortiums. The loser would not only be beaten to a lucrative bit of government business, it would also have to absorb the €50,000 cost of making its pitch.

Peter Greene, head of the Department of the Environment’s electoral franchise section, chaired the selection panel. He first went down the line of the Tender Evaluation Board, introducing each person by name and position. “Monica Leech was presented as ‘a media consultant’,” recalled a member of one of the tender team.

Her inclusion was a surprise: less than 18 months after she had been hired as a media adviser, Leech was playing a sensitive role in one of the department’s biggest decisions.

The board unanimously chose the McConnells Advertising/Q4 bid. It was a controversial choice. Q4 is a public relations firm run by Martin Mackin, a former Fianna Fail general secretary, and Jackie Gallagher, a former adviser to Bertie Ahern.

A spokesman for the Department of the Environment insists that everything was done properly. “The Tender Evaluation Board comprised four department officials and Leech,” he said. “The board shortlisted six tenderers to make presentations to it; two tenderers were invited for interview; a recommendation was made to the minister that the contract be awarded to the McConnells/Q4 consortium. All of these board decisions were unanimous.”

But the recent revelations of Leech’s political closeness to Cullen is likely to have added to the disappointment suffered by the losing consortium — QMP/Pembroke Communications. There is a distinct sense of “them and us” in the public relations and lobbying sectors in Dublin, with those who come from outside politics lacking the edge that ex-political players seem to possess.

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