The Planning Tribunal has heard that Liam Lawlor has up to £50,000 sterling in an off-shore account.
The inquiry heard he withdrew €300,000 from the account last year alone.
The former Fianna Fáil TD told the Tribunal he can no longer afford to comply with its orders for discovery of his financial records.
He says he cannot afford to pay overseas legal firms the thousands of pounds required to allow them to source records.
Tribunal chairman Judge Alan Mahon has questioned Mr Lawlor's inability to pay.
The judge said that apart from the stg£50,000, Mr Lawlor also received a Dáil severance payment of €116,000 and was spending an average of €200,000 a year.
When asked yesterday how much he had spent this year, Mr Lawlor said he had about €3,000 a month.
Judge Mahon said records produced this morning show it to be several times that figure.
Mr Lawlor said he has to prioritise his spending. He said he has more pressing issues than spending money on overseas lawyers to provide information to the Tribunal which will not progress matters.
He has also questioned the Tribunal's right to investigate how he spends his money.
Earlier, Mr Lawlor told the Tribunal that he issued false invoices to receive both political and business payments.
He had already told the inquiry that he used eight different company names to create false invoices for political contributions.
However, he said he did not think it was necessary to tell the Tribunal about other invoices for non-political payments.
