Brennan given time to produce documents

The Flood Tribunal has given Meath Builder Mr Tom Brennan until next Tuesday at 9 a.m. to produce documents and comply with four orders of discovery against him.

Mr Brennan had been given until today to furnish the Tribunal with information relating trust companies in the Isle of Man and Liechtenstein or face High Court proceedings for non-production of documents.

Meath builder Mr Tom Brennan

When a box of papers did eventually arrive from Liechtenstein it was found they were in German and would need to be translated.

Mr Justice Flood ruled that since some documents had been produced it would not be appropriate at this stage to invoke High Court proceedings.

However Mr Flood said the orders of discovery were "clear and specific" and they must be complied with.

Mr Patrick Hanratty SC, for the Tribunal, accused Mr Brennan of not providing the Tribunal with "a single piece of information in the course of his testimony".

Mr Hanratty asked Mr Brennan did he not keep any files himself of the correspondence he had had with various professional advisers.

Mr Brennan said he did not keep files on that sort of thing and that he usually dealt with correspondence when he received them and then threw them out.

In a increasingly heated exchange Mr Hanratty asked Mr Brennan: "In respect to all the dealings we have been discussing am I to believe you have no correspondence?"

Mr Brennan replied: "To the best of my knowledge that is 100 per cent right".

Mr Hanratty said: "Is it your position that you have no correspondence from anybody about anything?"

To which Mr Brennan said: "No, I don't".

Earlier both counsels made submissions in relation to the four orders of discovery against Mr Brennan.

Counsel for the tribunal claimed it was being "stonewalled" in its attempt to get the documents.

Mr Patrick Hanratty SC told the tribunal it was a "preposterous" position that Mr Brennan could not obtain financial documents relating to an Isle of Man trust that he himself set up.

Mr Martin Hayden SC for Mr Brennan said his client was in no way trying to frustrate the tribunal and that he was making every effort to obtain the documents in question.

Mr Hayden said Mr Brennan was not unwilling to comply with the orders but that the timespan involved and the time his client was spending in the witness box were frustrating his efforts.

Mr Hanratty he said the tribunal has consistently portrayed efforts that fail "as efforts to conceal".