THE former Taoiseach Mr Albert Reynolds, insisted that the beef tribunal report criticised government policy of the time and not him personally. He was being further questioned in his libel action against the Sunday Times newspaper yesterday.
The case continued in the absence of one of the jurors, who had a diabetic attack the previous night. This juror was discharged and the case is continuing with 11 jurors, following agreement between the two sides.
The beef tribunal was raised by Mr James Price QC, counsel for the Sunday Times, on the seventh day of the hearing in the High Court in London. Mr Reynolds is suing the Sunday Times over an article in its UK editions of November 24th, 1994, on the fall of the Fianna Fail/Labour coalition. The article entitled "Goodbye, Gombeen Man", continued: "Why a fib too far was fatal for Ireland's peacemaker and Mr Fixit."
Mr Price asked Mr Reynolds if he had been "a little selective" in presenting his premiership as a serene and untroubled success.
Mr Reynolds disagreed: "The peace process had saved hundreds of lives, and the economic statistics speak for themselves. These are facts."
Mr Price then asked him if the Government was being sued by the Goodman group of companies for damages estimated by Mr Justice Hamilton to be worth either £119 or £159 million. Mr Des O'Malley, then leader of the Progressive Democrats, had estimated the figure at £170 million.
Mr Reynolds said there was one policy for £70 million and during that period the Iraqis had paid £50 million. "If that figure was excluded from Mr O'Malley's figure you'd get the truth. I always deal with the truth whatever the consequences."
Counsel for the Sunday Times then took Mr Reynolds through the controversy surrounding export credit insurance. He asked him repeatedly if he had ignored the advice of his officials in increasing the export credit insurance for Iraq.
"We decided to kick-start the economy," explained Mr Reynolds.
"Your business was selling pet food to Europe," said Mr Price. "Did this give you any experience of the risks of selling meat to Iraq?"
"The two businesses are allied," replied Mr Reynolds.
Mr Price suggested that he was a man who, even when dealing with gigantic sums, ignored the advice of officials and made up his own mind about the export credit insurance.
"I reject the suggestion I recklessly spend taxpayers' money," replied Mr Reynolds. "Taxpayers money, if I'm spending it, or my money, if I'm spending it, if I believe it adds up, I go."
Turning to the introduction of the Bill in the Dail to increase the cover, Mr Price asked Mr Reynolds if he had mentioned when introducing it that half the cover was to cover beef exports to Iraq, at a time when there was large-scale public outrage in Ireland over the Iraqi government using chemical weapons against its own population.
"This was considered a very minor piece of legislation. Officials prepared the script. I delivered it as I was handed it," said Mr Reynolds.
Mr Price: "It might have become a major piece of legislation if the Dail knew it was to Iicence exports to the Iraqi regime."
Mr Reynolds: "The script was prepared by officials.
Mr Price: "I understand you to be blaming your officials."
Mr Reynolds: "That's a cheap shot, and I don't like it every time I hear it. I don't like that and I don't think it's nice."
Mr Price listed the countries mentioned in the speech, which included Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Argentina and China, but not Iraq.
"If you want to put a question mark over the credibility of the Irish Civil Service, I would have to reject it," said Mr Reynolds.
"I'm not putting a question mark over the credibility of the Irish Civil Service. I'm putting a question mark over your credibility," replied Mr Price.
"I totally reject that. I didn't mislead the House then or at any time since," said Mr Reynolds.
Mr Price went on to quote from Mr Justice Hamilton's conclusions in the beef tribunal report. "He was scathingly critical of you in this passage," he said.
"Scathingly critical of me personally, no," replied Mr Reynolds. "He was critical of the policies in the past, and he's right. An investigation was carried out later. Resaid departments should have worked more closely together and I agree with him."
Counsel for the Sunday Times then raised the issuing of a press statement by Mr Reynolds on the night the report of the tribunal was published, in which he had said he was "totally vindicated".
"I would suggest that `totally vindicated' was quite misleading," he said. "Did Mr Dick Spring accuse you of breaking an agreement about the report? Did Mr Spring say he was locked out of government offices?"
"Mr Spring was in Kerry," said Mr Reynolds.
"That his adviser was? Did Dick Spring accuse you of not being available to him?" counsel asked.
"I will take this opportunity to put it on the record that I made no instructions to lock anyone out of the door he complained of. I've never seen that door locked. There's a mystery about that night," said Mr Reynolds.
He said he had gone to a private office to read the report, and then for something to eat. He continued: "What right this man thought he had to walk all over my inner offices just beats me."
Mr Justice French then asked: "Can we move to another topic?"
"Your lordship has taken the very words out of my mouth," replied Mr Price.
He then raised the issuing of Irish passports to the Masri family, who had lent over £1 million to Mr Reynolds's company at favourable interest rates.
"That loan was negotiated by my son," said Mr Reynolds. "There's been a scheme there since 1988. There are about 30 companies who are the beneficiaries of that scheme."
"You can imagine the interest there would be in this country if a million pounds at very favourable rates were invested in the prime minister's company and in return they got Irish passports," said Mr Price.
He drew Mr Reynolds's attention to an article on this controversy in The Irish Times, written by Mr Vincent Browne, and quoted Mr Reynolds describing Mr Browne last Monday as "a very good investigative journalist".
Mr Browne had said it was "difficult to believe" that Mr Reynolds knew nothing about the investment, Mr Price said, quoting the journalist as saying, "he must have been perplexed as to why the company was getting a loan at such soft terms".
Mr Reynolds: "Further on he says that Dick Spring examined the file and found nothing amiss.
Mr Price: "He says Mr Spring's reputation is damaged, perhaps irrevocably, by his apparent zeal to find nothing wrong in the Masri passport case."
He continued: "You said that the one thing you cannot accept is people calling you a liar. He says it is difficult to credit that you knew nothing. He says it is difficult to believe. It is quite clear. He attacks your integrity. Did you sue Mr Browne?"
Mr Reynolds: "I don't regard Mr Browne as calling me a liar in this article. He puts the two sides."
Mr Price: "Are we to understand that it is all right to say it is difficult to believe, but not all right to say you tell a lie?"
Mr Reynolds: "I'm interested in the truth. As Shakespeare said, `To thine own self be true and you won't be false to others'. That's me. There's no liar in that article."
Earlier, Mr Price pointed out that Mr Reynolds had objected to the sentence "Spring entered a deal with the devil" in the Sunday Times article.
Mr Price then distributed copies of Mr Sean Duignan's book about his time as government press secretary (One Spin on The Merry-go-round) to the judge, to Mr Reynolds and to counsel for Mr Reynolds, Lord Williams.