The former General Secretary of Fine Gael has taken the stand at the Moriarty Tribunal. Jim Miley is being asked about his role in accepting a donation of $50,000 that was paid to the party in May 1997. Telenor originally made this payment to the former Fine Gael fundraiser, David Austin, in late 1995.
Mr Miley said that he was "surprised" about the size of the donation that was paid by Mr David Austin, since he normally gave relatively small donations, in the region of hundreds of pounds. Mr Miley said that he recalled a conversation he had with Mr Austin in the weeks before the payment was made in which Mr Austin said that the money was in his "dollar account".
Mr Miley has told the tribunal that Fine Gael had not subsequently acknowledged the donation because there was no need given the prior conversation and the fact that Mr Austin had himself been a fundraiser for the party. The former General Secretary also said that 'there was no systematic method of receipting donations' at the time.
Denis O'Brien earlier repeated in evidence that it was Telenor and not Esat Digifone who made a controversial payment to Fine Gael in 1995. The multimillionaire businessman also said that he stood by his assertion in previous evidence that Telenor had subsequently "made" Esat reimburse them. He said that, during shareholder negotiations, Esat Digifone had been pushed into agreeing to it.
Mr O'Brien was reminded to be careful about the language he used when he said suddenly "we were asked for a donation and we gave a donation". He went on to correct himself and say that Telenor had made the donation. Counsel for the Tribunal suggested to him that his use of the word "we" was not a slip of the tongue.
After a short break, the Tribunal resumed this morning with Mr O'Brien back in the witness box giving evidence that conflicts directly with evidence given by key representatives involved in the controversial payment. Mr O'Brien has disputed the evidence given by Jim Miley. In the statement, Mr Miley said that former party fundraiser David Austin told him that Mr O'Brien had agreed to make a donation to the party, but he wanted it made via Telenor in order to ensure confidentiality. Mr O'Brien says that he never said that.
Mr O'Brien also said that he did not recollect making comments attributed to him in another written statement, this time from John Fortune, a former director on the Board of Esat Digifone. John Fortune said that he told Mr O'Brien that Telenor were going to get in touch with Fine Gael to seek confirmation that they had received the $50,000 donation. John Fortune said that Mr O'Brien replied that since Esat Digifone had paid for the donation, they should be the ones to seek confirmation.
However, Mr O'Brien said that he does not recollect any of this. The Moriarty Tribunal has also been told that they have received a large number of new documents relating to matters currently under inquiry. Counsel for the Tribunal John Coughlan SC said that the documents mentioned a large number of people who will now have to be notified.
