Any journalist offered briefings by the Quinns should insist meetings be public and all documents be disclosed, writes FINTAN O'TOOLE
Much of the PR campaign being run by the Quinn family is highly visible, with accomplished TV performances by family members. But the most effective PR is a word in the ear.
The Quinn family’s strategy in this regard has consisted of at least two interrelated parts. One is the offer of “off-the-record” (ie confidential) briefings. The other is the presentation of documents purporting to show that the findings of the High Court that led to contempt orders against Seán Quinn, Seán Quinn jnr and Peter Darragh Quinn are wrong.
The Quinns know that they are on a winner when they rail against Anglo Irish Bank – the most disastrous institution in the history of the State. But they also know that, if they want to undermine the courts, they have to get over a very high hurdle, set with admirable clarity by Miss Justice Elizabeth Dunne: “What has never been in dispute is the fact that a sum of €455 million approximately is due to Anglo.
“Instead of trying to repay the admitted debt due, the Quinn family and in particular the respondents have taken every step possible to make it as difficult as can be to recover any amount due. They have engaged in a complex, complicated and, no doubt, costly, series of steps designed to put the assets of the International Property Group beyond the reach of Anglo, in a blatant, dishonest and deceitful manner.”
I’ve made this point here in a number of columns. Last week, I was contacted by a representative of the family to say that this claim (which is the High Court’s, not mine) is “fundamentally incorrect” and offering that “in order for the family to set the record straight and put their side of the story to you, members of the family would like the opportunity to discuss these issues with you on an ‘off the record’ basis.”
My response was, and is, that I’m very happy to meet any members of the Quinn family – on two conditions. One is that the meeting should not be “off the record” – since vast sums of public money are involved here, the public has a right to know any relevant information.
The second is that in advance of such a meeting all documents relevant to the transactions at issue in Miss Justice Dunne’s ruling should be provided to me and/or any other journalist from The Irish Times. This would allow me to formulate informed questions. It seems obvious that, if the family really is concerned to correct alleged misunderstandings of what Mr Justice Peter Kelly has called its “mesmerisingly complex” schemes, it would be anxious to allow access to all the documentation.
This is especially important for two reasons. One is that Seán Quinn, Seán Quinn jnr and Peter Darragh Quinn have been found to have an extraordinarily liberal attitude to the whole concept of evidence, even under oath.
In relation to their evidence before her, Miss Justice Dunne uses phrases such as “simply cannot be true”, “frankly unbelievable”, “completely lacking in credibility”, “evasive, less than forthright, obstructive, unco-operative and at times untruthful”. In two cases, documents presented to the court were found to have been “fabricated or falsified” – in one, clauses were added to an existing contract and in another the document was backdated to make it look like it was created before the court ordered the Quinns to stop stripping assets.
Even if one could put aside reservations about the commitment of the Quinns to the truth, there is also a problem with the document the family’s PR adviser is circulating. That document purports to show that the €455 million of agreed debt is secured on companies other than the ones at issue in the court case. It lists companies where, the family claims, there has been no attempt to strip assets. But we know that the Quinns have been shifting assets between companies – without full disclosure of the files, it is impossible for any journalist to know how real are the assets and liabilities of a particular company.
In any case, even with what we do know, it is obvious that some of what the family is claiming is simply untrue. Its document claims, for example, in relation to Quinn Properties Ukraine that “No action was taken by the Quinn family in relation to this asset” – in other words that the family has not tried to siphon money from this particular company. But the High Court ruling details the siphoning off of $500,000 from this company via a bogus contract. Even within the family’s own carefully selective briefings, therefore, there are obvious untruths.
Under these circumstances, it is important that any journalist offered private briefings by the Quinns should insist that meetings be public and that all documents be disclosed. I’ve never met any victim of an injustice who would not agree enthusiastically to those conditions.
If, as they purport to believe, the Quinns have been monstrously traduced by the courts, why would they not do the same? But the Quinn family has rejected my offer of an on-the-record meeting preceded by full disclosure of documents. That offer stands.