Taoiseach Bertie Ahern told the Dáil that if he had been asked to give approval for a confidential agreement in relation to the proposal to build a casino in the Phoenix Park, he probably would have.
"But I wasn't asked," he insisted. "Nobody was asked at that time." An Post National Lottery "went ahead and did that for a five-month period in 1994 and in 1998, but I was not involved. If I was asked, however - I will be honest about it - I see no reason that I would not have given it, looking at the papers."
Mr Ahern was responding to Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny, who had called on the Taoiseach to release all papers in relation to proposals to build a casino in the Phoenix Park so that "people can make up their minds about it".
Mr Ahern said that "in 1998, the then minister was asked for approval in advance and he gave approval. That is all it was about. The totally unfair allegation was that there was something wrong with that, but there was nothing wrong with it whatsoever. I did nothing wrong and even if I had given approval, it would not have been wrong." During Taoiseach's questions Mr Kenny said documentation could not be obtained prior to the introduction of the Freedom of Information Act.
Questions had been raised about Mr Ahern's role in approval for the National Lottery to be involved in a proposal in the 1990s to build a casino in the Phoenix Park.
"The casino was never built, yet those papers cannot be obtained under the Freedom of Information Act." Mr Ahern pointed out that "the Department of Finance has fairly good records and it gave me a report on that matter, which was a live issue with a number of organisations for an extensive period".
He said "the issue came down to whether, in 1994, I had given approval for a process to allow a confidential agreement. To be frank, if I had been asked to give approval to that, I am sure I would have, but I was not asked".
