Ms Caroline Bailey made up fictitious names in a Bovale Development chequebook journal to hide the fact that money was paid in political contributions, she told the Flood tribunal yesterday. She also said the chequebook journal containing the fictitious names might have been shredded.
Cheques were entered into the journal for the year 19961997 under the names of people to whom deposits on houses were supposedly returned. The journal was then passed to the company auditor, Mr Joe O'Toole, to carry out the yearly audit. Ms Bailey, the company bookkeeper, admitted yesterday that the information entered was not correct.
"I would have made up fictitious names . . . in an effort to hide them in the account," she said. She admitted the names were made up to hide political contributions but said she did not know which political party or which politician had received the money.
When asked if this had been done to mislead the auditor of the company, she replied that it had. She said she had been instructed by the directors to enter the false information.
The tribunal had heard earlier from Mr Joe O'Toole, auditor for Bovale Development, that there were differences between the cheque-book journal he had been given in order to carry out the audit, which contained the fictitious names, and the journal the tribunal had been given by the Baileys, which contained entries for political contributions.
When Ms Bailey was asked if she had told the accountant the documents had been changed, she replied: "I can't be absolute but I really feel he was aware."
Ms Bailey said the journal had been changed from recording the names of fictitious people to recording payment for political contributions "to make it obvious to the tribunal". "We had gone back over the journal and re-amended the journal so it was correct."
She added that the directors of the company had wanted to hand a correct cheque-book journal in to the tribunal and they had. "They were trying to be completely honest with the tribunal."
Mr Desmond O'Neill SC, for the tribunal, said, however, that the accounts were still not accurate as there were entries in the original journal which did not correspond with the auditor's report. "It's still not 100 per cent accurate," she replied.
Ms Bailey then said the original cheque-book containing fictitious names might have been shredded. When asked by Mr Desmond O'Neill SC what had happened to the cheque-book after it had been received back from Mr O'Toole when he carried out the audit, she replied: "I don't know. I would imagine it was shredded."
Ms Bailey said it was a wise decision to alter the cheque-book journal. She said she had not physically carried out the alterations but one of two employees from Bovale Development had. She gave the names of the employees to the tribunal. She said she had told the employees it was vital that the books were correct going in to the tribunal.
Ms Bailey said the chequebook journal was probably altered when it came back from Mr O'Toole in March 1998, after he had carried out the audit. She said the last alteration had probably been made before the books were given in to the tribunal.