Quarryvale architect says he has no records of his meetings

THE ARCHITECT for the Quarryvale development had no records of meetings or correspondence with Cork developer Owen O'Callaghan, lobbyist Frank Dunlop or the late Liam Lawlor, the tribunal was told yesterday.

Ambrose Kelly, who designed the Liffey Valley Shopping Centre at Quarryvale, also said that he did not keep any business diaries to record meetings on the project.

Mr Kelly, who said he emigrated five years ago, told the tribunal he "emptied his filing cabinets" when he was sent an order of discovery by the tribunal in 2000. The tribunal sent a van to collect the documentation, which filled 14 boxes, he said.

He said nothing was returned to him until four years later, after which he provided a narrative statement to the tribunal.

"I gave you whatever I could access in my office," he said. Mr Kelly said he did not correspond much with Mr O'Callaghan and though Mr Lawlor sent him correspondence "like confetti", he did not keep it. He said it wasn't Mr Dunlop's policy to write to him.

Senior counsel Patricia Dillon, for the tribunal, asked Mr Kelly if he kept any record of meetings he had with elected representatives at his office. "I didn't see it as my function," Mr Kelly said.

He said it was his function to describe the project to elected representatives and explain its intent.

He said he did not keep a diary of any of the meetings he had with councillors or other people in relation to the development.

Judge Gerald Keys asked Mr Kelly how he could remember meetings if he did not keep a diary.

Mr Kelly said he never agreed meetings two or three weeks in advance and most were arranged by a phone call on the morning of the meeting.

"Are you seriously telling us that you had a staff of 12 people in your office, that you never had a business diary of any description recording any business meetings you had; is that what you're telling me and my colleagues?" Judge Keys asked.

"I never used a diary to record business meetings," Mr Kelly said. He said he wrote things on sheets of paper or in copybooks.

Tribunal chairman Judge Alan Mahon asked Mr Kelly if he might have destroyed documents prior to the discovery order in 2000.

"We wouldn't have had a policy of destroying anything, Mr Chairman," Mr Kelly responded.

He said if the suggestion was that he had not given over all of the documents available to the tribunal, that was not true.

Ms Dillon highlighted a letter from Mr Kelly to Mr Lawlor in November 1991 and provided to the tribunal by Mr Lawlor. She asked Mr Kelly why he had not provided that letter to the tribunal. "If I had it, believe me, you would have it," Mr Kelly said.

Ms Dillon also questioned him about a £10,000 cheque paid by Mr O'Callaghan's company Riga, to Mr Kelly in March 1992.It was a loan from Mr O'Callaghan on account and he needed it to pay back a friend, he said.