PAC won't give Ansbacher file to MacSharry lawyers

The Dail’s Public Accounts Committee has said it cannot hand over the Ansbacher dossier to lawyers representing former Fianna Fail finance minster Ray MacSharry.

PAC chairman John McGuinness said the committee received a letter from Arthur Cox Solicitors, seeking Ansbacher documents in which he is named.

Mr MacSharry is one of five former politicians named in the Dáil by Sinn Féin TD Mary Lou McDonald as having been in a dossier of alleged offshore account holders. All five have rejected the claims.

“They are not committee papers and it is not a matter for us,” Mr McGuinness said.

He added that the issue of the names being mentioned by Ms McDonald in the Dáil is a matter for the Ceann Comhairle and not one for the PAC.

Separately, Mr McGuinness said the PAC should hear from Tipperary woman Annette De Vere Hunt who is being taken to court by the National Asset Management Agency.

Ms De Vere Hunt, whose husband Philip took his own life, has asked for a chance to explain her case to the committee.

Mr De Vere Hunt took his own life in 2012 after one of Nama’s companies, NALM, took a case against him.

At his inquest year, the coroner said Mr De Vere Hunt’s dealings with the State’s bad bank “brought him to the end of his tether”.

Mr McGuinness said the Committee should hear from the woman as “what she says is compelling”. He added that her story gives an important insight into how Nama conducts its business.