FINE GAEL leader Enda Kenny has put down a motion of no confidence in Minister for Defence Willie O’Dea which will be debated in the Dáil next week.
Mr Kenny’s decision to raise the political temperature was taken in response to a short Dáil statement by Mr O’Dea last night on the background to his court settlement with Limerick Sinn Féin councillor Maurice Quinlivan who had sued him for defamation.
Mr Kenny said that the Minister’s explanation had raised a series of questions which had prompted the no confidence motion.
It will be debated during the party’s Private Members’ time next Tuesday and Wednesday evenings, assuming the Government declines to allocate time for the motion this week.
In his Dáil statement, Mr O’Dea insisted he had not lied under oath or “admitted to lying under oath” as had been claimed in recent days.
“I made a mistake,” said the Minister, who added the other party to the court action which led to the controversy had accepted this in the settlement agreed in court.
Mr O’Dea said a defamation action taken against him by Mr Quinlivan had been settled by mutual agreement in the High Court on December 21st last. The case followed on from remarks he had made in an interview with a journalist from the Limerick Chronicle.
“I have openly and fully acknowledged that my recollection of some of what I said in the interview as described in my original affidavit was mistaken. I corrected the mistake when I realised it. I admitted the mistake and apologised for it,” said Mr O’Dea.
He said he knew the interview had been recorded. “I didn’t have a transcript of the interview when I made my statement but, as I had seen the report of it in the newspaper, I felt sure a transcript of that tape recording would vindicate my recollection. I was wrong, it didn’t.”
Mr O’Dea said when he later saw a transcript, he saw that, contrary to his recollection, he had gone further than what had been quoted in the newspaper.
He contacted his solicitor and corrected the affidavit. “I was not forced or pressed to do this. I did so of my own volition as I then knew that my original affidavit was wrong.”
The Minister accepted the evidence he had given the court was mistaken but he added that evidence and testimony was regularly corrected in the courts without allegations of lying.
Labour TD Pat Rabbitte said that Mr O’Dea had a cheek to claim he had forgotten what he had said in the interview. He also expressed the hope that Green Party leader John Gormley would “revert to his high moral standards” when the motion of no confidence came before the Dáil.
Earlier, Taoiseach Brian Cowen told the Dáil he did not believe there had been any breaches of the law or codes of conduct by Mr O’Dea.
