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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
12May 2015
NEWS
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Catherine Murphy, TD interview 14
Jerry Beades 17
Left Alliance 18
Environmental cost 20
Seán MacBride cover-up? 22
Local Authorities 24
Alan Kelly, Minister for the
Environment profile 26
Direct provision resignations 30
Ignoble direct provision 31
Mannix Flynn reply 32
JobBridge 33
Water campaign 34
Ansbacher
cover-up upon
cover-up
Whistleblower Ryan’s evidence supported
by two other forensic accountants.
By Frank Connolly
s to the mid s.
Feehily, who has since been appointed
to head the new independent policing
authority, told the PAC that she was
satisfied the matter had been dealt with
but could not comment on individual
tax investigations. Her response does
not rule out the prospect that for all
their forceful denials some of the indi-
viduals named did settle outstanding
revenue issues arising from offshore
accounts.
What also emerges from correspond-
ence between McDonald and the CPP
over recent months is that Ryan is sup-
ported in his contentions by “two senior
colleagues, both forensic accountants”.
In a letter to the CPP in February last,
McDonald strongly defended her action
in naming the former politicians includ-
ing a number of former Fianna Fáil
ministers and one Fine Gael minister;
and claimed she did so after she
received advice from a parliamentary
legal advisor to the effect that the only
forum where she could raise the serious
allegations of tax evasion was on the
floor of the Dáil. Previously, the PAC had
been advised that it could not investi-
gate the allegations set out in a detailed
dossier prepared by Ryan (much of
which was published in Village in a
recent edition).
T
HE controversy over the naming in
the Dáil by Mary Lou McDonald of
several former politicians in con-
nection with offshore accounts
continues to rumble on. The Sinn Féin
deputy leader has rejected a finding by
the Oireachtas Committee of Procedure
and Privileges (CPP) that she abused her
parliamentary privilege when she
named the politicians, including former
ministers, in the Dáil on rd December
last. She has also asked for the legal
advice given to the Committee on which
its finding of abuse of privilege was
based.
Despite attempts by the political
establishment, aided by the usually
compliant voices in the mainstream
media, to close down the controversy,
and the loud legal threats emanating
from some of the former ministers
named in the House, the issue has not
gone away.
Revenue Commissioner, Josephine
Feehily, has told the Public Accounts
Committee (PAC) that her officials had
fully investigated the allegations con-
tained in the dossier prepared by
authorised officer, Gerard Ryan. Former
politicians allegedly used Ansbacher/
Cayman Island accounts managed by
accountant Des Traynor and after his
death, by Padraig Colleary – from the
She said Ryan was “a senior civil serv-
ant who had been appointed as the
authorised investigating officer into
allegations of tax evasion and
Ansbacher accounts by a previous Gov-
ernment. His professional competence
as a forensic accountant is not in ques-
tion. He made his disclosure in
accordance with the Protected Disclo-
sures Act . I believe that this
disclosure is made in good faith and in
the public interest. His allegations are
documented and are backed up by two
senior colleagues, both also forensic
accountants”.
One of these is senior counsel John
Hennessy who was retained by the
Department of Jobs Enterprise and
Innovation to assist and advise Gerard
Ryan. The other officer has not been
publicly identified.
McDonald also described in her
lengthy submission how a significant
claim by Ryan, that the current Minis-
ter in the department, Richard Bruton,
had sat for two years on a detailed wit-
ness statement the authorised officer
had prepared and only released it to the
Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation
when the controversy broke in Novem-
ber .
“For my part I made no assertion of
wrongdoing against any individual”,
Mary Lou McDonald
The Revenue’s
response does
not rule out
the prospect
that for all
their forceful
denials some
or all of the
individuals
named
did settle
outstanding
revenue
issues arising
from offshore
accounts
“
May 2015 13
McDonald wrote. “I merely referred to
those allegations made – and subse-
quently stood over – by the
whistleblower. In doing so, I very con-
sciously and specifically refrained from
offering an opinion on the veracity of
the allegations, and moreover I did not
assert that they were true. It is in the
public interest that these allegations of
tax evasion and political obstruction be
publicly stated and investigated”.
In response to her letter the CPP
informed the deputy that her Dáil
remarks were “in the nature of being
defamatory” and “prima facie an abuse
of privilege” and asked her to “make a
personal explanation to the House: in
effect to withdraw the utterances with-
out qualification”, failing which the
committee would recommend that she
be reprimanded. Unsurprisingly,
McDonald did not accept this finding
and is still awaiting a response to her
request for the legal advice given to the
CPP to support it as well as the minutes
of all relevant meetings where the
matter was discussed.
The CPP also released copies of letters
from the former politicians who
claimed that they had been defamed by
McDonald’s remarks in the Dáil and
from former Tanaiste and PD leader,
Mary Harney, who denied the “untrue
and defamatory” allegation that she had
terminated Ryan’s investigation when it
threw up the name of a prominent poli-
tician associated with her.
Harney first appointed Ryan as an
authorised officer to investigate the tax
evasion scheme operated by Guinness &
Mahon and its subsidiary, Ansbacher
(Cayman), in . In July the
High Court, at her request, appointed
inspectors to investigate the Irish busi-
ness of Ansbacher (Cayman). The
investigation was headed up by the late
Declan Costello, former TD, Attorney
General and President of the High
Court, until he resigned for health rea-
sons in . It found that Guinness &
Mahon (Ireland) Ltd. and its former
managing director, Des Traynor had
promoted a scheme of tax evasion in
Ireland through offshore trusts and that
Ansbacher (Cayman) Ltd had operated
as an unlicensed bank in this country
(including from the offices of Cement
Roadstone Holdings in Fitzwilliam
Square in Dublin for many years).
In , Ryan discovered that Cos-
tello had held a deposit account in
Guinness & Mahon from to
containing £, which was man-
aged by Traynor. When contacted by
Ryan, Costello denied ever having such
an account or having dealt with
Traynor. Ryan claimed that the High
Court investigation was compromised
by what he described in the dossier cir-
culated last year as Costello’s “major
conflict of interest”.
In June , four months after
Ryan informed Minister Harney that he
had uncovered evidence that a close
associate of hers had an Ansbacher
(Cayman) account his investigation was
closed down and his request to com-
plete it was refused. Her successor,
Micheál Martin, also refused a similar
request in early . In July of that
year Ryan told Martin that a “huge
effort was made by certain persons” to
ensure that evidence of the Cayman
Island accounts held by senior Fianna
Fáil TDs never came to light. Martin
directed Ryan to name those persons,
provide details of when and how each
made a huge effort to ensure that the
evidence never came to light and to sub-
stantiate this in writing to him.
In November , a -page
report was delivered to the minister
having been approved for release by
John Hennessy SC. It was forwarded to
the Garda Bureau of Fraud Investiga-
tion, the Office of the Director of
Corporate Enforcement, the Revenue
Commissioners and the Moriarty and
Mahon tribunals. Only the Revenue
Commissioners met Ryan to discuss its
contents. A later report providing
details of what happened to the
accounts of the Fianna Fáil TDs in
was sent to another minister, Batt
O’Keeffe, in November and he
passed it on to the same agencies, again
with no result. In March , the new
minister, Richard Bruton, also failed to
reply to a letter from Ryan requesting a
meeting to discuss the Cayman
accounts while the Attorney General
Maire Whelan also neglected to respond
to similar correspondence.
“The fact that this evidence has been
with these authorities for at least
years and no progress has been made in
its investigation amounts to a cover up
of the evidence of wrongdoing. It is in
the public interest that the wrongdoing
associated with the senior Fianna Fáil
TDs’ (and at least one Fine Gael minis-
ter’s) very secret Ansbacher accounts be
properly investigated”, Ryan has argued
in his submissions.
It is worth waiting for his next move
given that his attempt to bring his dos-
sier of sensational claims to the PAC has
been closed down and that the effort by
Mary Lou McDonald to reveal some of
its spicier details has also been stifled
by her parliamentary colleagues.
The Taoiseach has said that it is up to
the Garda fraud unit to decide on the
next course of action but this may not
be the end of the matter as far as the
Dáil and the PAC are concerned not-
withstanding the diligent efforts of her
parliamentary colleagues to prevent
Mary Lou McDonald or others from
adding to the spicy details already in
the public arena.
In February , enterprise minis-
ter, Mary Harney, met with members of
the ‘The Quarry
and Concrete
Family Alli-
ance” which
was pursuing
complaints
over the abuse
of its monopoly
power by one
of Ireland’s
biggest compa-
nies, Cement
Roadstone
Holdings.
She assured
them that the Competition Authority
and the Director of the Office of Corpo-
rate Enforcement, Paul Appleby, would
examine CRH and its behaviour. She
suggested they also make a submission
to the Moriarty Tribunal about the cir-
cumstances surrounding the
controversial acquisition by CRH of a
large quarry at Glen Ding in county
Wicklow in .
Charles Haughey’s accountant, Des
Traynor, was on the board of CRH as far
back as and his father-in-law and
former Taoiseach, Sean Lemass, was a
former chairman of the company.
No investigation by either of the
agencies she suggested ensued follow-
ing the meeting with Harney while
the Moriarty tribunal also declined
to investigate Glen Ding. In ,
Harney agreed to meet the Family
Alliance again but cancelled the
arrangement without explanation.
Des Traynor, Charlie Haugh-
ey’s bagman, ran the Ansbacher
accounts and was chairman of CRH. •
McDonald did
not accept this
finding and is
still awaiting
a response to
her request
for the
legal advice
given to the
Privileges
Committee to
support it, and
the minutes
of meetings
where the
matter was
discussed
“
Mary Harney:
couldn’t deliver CRH
investigations
