Redmond says he had no role in rezoning key site

MAHON TRIBUNAL: The convicted former official George Redmond has said he has not had a role in planning in 25 years and had no involvement in trying to have the Carrickmines Valley rezoned to suit businessman Mr Jim Kennedy.

"I had no hand, act or part in colouring the baubles [of the Carrickmines Valley]," Redmond told the tribunal yesterday. Land agent Mr Sam Stanley has alleged Mr Kennedy told him Redmond would "colour the map" in the Carrickmines area, meaning he would rezone Mr Kennedy's land from agricultural to residential.

Both Redmond and former Fianna Fail TD Mr Liam Lawlor yesterday got their chance to cross-examine Mr Stanley. Neither man has legal representation at the tribunal at present.

Mr Stanley admitted his evidence about Redmond was hearsay, because it was based on what Mr Kennedy had told him about the former assistant Dublin city and county manager.

Redmond, who attended the hearing on temporary release from Cloverhill prison, said he didn't know Mr Stanley.

He asked the witness if he knew him or had ever met him. "I stand here in the flesh," he said, standing so Mr Stanley could see him.

"I can say the same for you, I never met you nor heard of you before," the witness said. "As far as I'm concerned, you may be as innocent as a new-born baby or as pure as the driven snow." What Mr Kennedy had said to him could have been "a bag of feathers or a bunch of fluff" as far as he was concerned.

Mr Stanley agreed that Mr Kennedy had given him the impression that Redmond was "Mr Planning". However, he didn't believe Mr Kennedy all the time.

Asked if he thought Mr Kennedy was "an outrageous liar," Mr Stanley replied that he was certainly "economical with the truth".

He accepted Mr Kennedy could be "a rich mixture of bustle and spoof".

Redmond said Mr Kennedy was "a most complex character," to which the witness replied that this was "a euphemism".

Mr Stanley said most of Redmond's problems with his evidence would have to be answered by Mr Kennedy, but it didn't seem he would be giving evidence. Mr Kennedy, who lives in the Isle of Man, has refused to cooperate with the tribunal.

"It seems it will be like Hamlet without the Prince," Redmond said.

Mr Redmond accused the tribunal of "cherry-picking" the documents it chose to circulate to the parties. He called on tribunal lawyers to make available the sanitary services files for Carrickmines. It was "inconceivable" that some of these documents should be excluded.

Mr Lawlor also accused the tribunal of "selectivity" in the documents it circulated. He said technical information was available that "wholly contradicted any allegations of insider trading in the Carrickmines Valley". The planning files should be made available for the hearings, he said.

Mr Lawlor also accused tribunal lawyers of trying to "prove the unprovable" by raising his name in connection with the ownership of the Carrickmines land when they travelled to interview Mr Stanley in Galway three years ago.

Tribunal lawyers had "gone on a junket" to Galway to see Mr Stanley when he could have come for interview in Dublin.

However, Mr Des O'Neill SC, for the tribunal, said Mr Lawlor's name had come up in the interview between Mr Stanley and his tribunal colleagues in relation to payments to politicians, and not in relation to Carrickmines.

Earlier, Mr Stanley told Mr Ian Finlay SC, for Mr John Caldwell, that he believed the Carrickmines lands were worth about €50 million today. Paisley Park, the company that acquired the property, paid a farmer, Mr Bob Tracey, for £700,000 in 1989.

All sorts of figures had been "bandied about" for the value of the value of the lands, Mr Stanley said. However, he noted that compensation of €13 million had been awarded for 20 acres of the land that were acquired for the construction of the South-Eastern motorway. On that basis, the entire 108-acre property was worth about €50 million.

This meant that his claim for a 20 per cent stake in Paisley Park would be worth €10 million. However, he didn't feel he could afford to take High Court action against Mr Kennedy.

In addition, before some of the land was rezoned in 1997, the lands had little value; in the words of Mr Kennedy, it could only be classified as "a bird sanctuary".