Builders paid auctioneer to `deliver' land, claim lawyers

Builders Brennan and McGowan paid a £100,000 "bribe" to the auctioneer Mr John Finnegan in return for him "delivering" a property for them to buy, tribunal lawyers have claimed.

Ms Patricia Dillon SC, for the tribunal, said Brennan and McGowan had a "dirty little deal" with Mr Finnegan in which the builders put up the money and Mr Finnegan "delivered" 10 acres owned by the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Monkstown. And she asked whether the three men had a similar arrangement in five other transactions in which they were involved.

Mr Joe McGowan, in the witness box, rejected the suggestion. He said Mr Finnegan had introduced the builders to the land, and helped to "sort the whole thing out" by advising on the merging of the leasehold and freehold titles. This greatly increased the value of the property, because it opened the way for houses to be built there.

Ms Dillon pointed out that at the time Mr Finnegan made the arrangement with the two builders, he was acting in his professional capacity as a selling agent for the nuns. She asked the witness if it crossed his mind that Mr Finnegan had a conflict of interest. Mr McGowan said it hadn't, because the price they paid at the time was the market value for the land.

The nuns paid Mr Finnegan £10,500 for his work as an auctioneer in selling the leasehold on the land. But he got £105,000 from his involvement with Brennan and McGowan.

"The £100,000 was a bribe you paid to John Finnegan so he could deliver the nuns to you," said Ms Dillon.

Mr McGowan: "That is not true."

Ms Dillon said it "beggared belief" that the three men would share the proceeds of the deal equally without having invested equally. Mr Finnegan hadn't invested "one ha'penny"; instead, his investment was to "deliver" the Monkstown lands to Brennan and McGowan, against the interest of the nuns.

The deal is one of six transactions in which Brennan and McGowan and Mr Finnegan collaborated in the 1970s and 1980s. In each case, the proceeds were sent offshore for distribution among the three men. Mr Finnegan was paid hundreds of thousands of pounds even though he had no ownership of or investment in four of the properties involved.

The tribunal's interest arises out of the fact that in the last such deal, involving lands at Sandyford, £60,000 was paid to the former minister, Mr Ray Burke.

Lawyers for Brennan and McGowan and Mr Finnegan spent much of the day objecting to questions from Ms Dillon about the motivation for their clients' complex partnership arrangements, involving the payment of money offshore.

They objected when Mr McGowan was asked to explain the reason why the proceeds were channelled offshore. They argued that these were matters for the Revenue Commissioners, and were outside the terms of reference of the tribunal.

According to Ms Dillon Mr Finnegan has so far failed to provide the tribunal with the accounts of his offshore company, Foxtown Investments, into which his share was paid. As a result, the tribunal was unable to lead evidence on this matter.

When Ms Dillon asked the witness why the offshore arrangement was set up, Mr Dominick Hussey SC, for Mr Finnegan, objected. There was no evidence whatsoever that Foxtown Investments had paid any money to Mr Burke, he said, and there was therefore no reason for the tribunal to inquire further into the matter.

Mr Hussey said the tribunal could not make a blanket inquiry into Mr Finnegan.

Unless it could show a link between Mr Finnegan and Mr Burke it was not entitled to ask questions on the matter. It wasn't enough to say that "maybe" there could be a link.