The Taoiseach Mr Ahern said yesterday he had "no recollection" of a cheque for £25,000 made out to cash and signed by him and Mr Charles Haughey in June 1989. The cheque was lodged to an account linked to the personal finances of Mr Haughey.
The £25,000 came from an account where Mr Haughey's party leader's allowance was lodged when he was leader of Fianna Fail. The allowance is a payment from the State to the leaders of political parties, and the tribunal is investigating whether Mr Haughey made personal use of some of the money.
From 1984 to 1992, when Mr Haughey resigned, the total amount paid by the State was £1.05 million. The money was lodged in a bank account on Baggot Street.
A system operated whereby two signatories were needed for cheques drawn on the account. There were three signatories - Mr Haughey, Mr Ahern and Mr Ray MacSharry. Mr MacSharry rarely signed cheques. Mr Ahern said he would have co-signed "most" of the 1,615 cheques drawn in the period 1984 to 1992.
At times the administrator of the account, Ms Eileen Foy, would ask him to sign blank cheques "for administrative convenience", Mr Ahern said. He did so. Ms Foy was a highly competent and efficient administrator, he said, and there had never been any queries over the running of the account as far as he knew.
Mr Ahern said he had no recollection of a cheque for £25,000 made out to cash and signed by him, which found its way into an account in Guinness & Mahon bank linked to the personal finances of Mr Haughey. The cheque was dated June 16th, 1989, the day after the general election. It was a busy time and it was likely he had pre-signed the cheque, which would have then been filled in and signed by Mr Haughey, Mr Ahern said.
Mr Ahern said he had no recollection of signing any large cheques made out to cash. In the four years he had been party leader the largest cheque from the party leader's allowance made out to cash has been for £1,000.
The pre-signing of cheques "may transpire to be an inappropriate practice", the Taoiseach said. He also said it was last autumn before it was brought to his attention that "collateral use" might have been made of the party leader's allowance during Mr Haughey's reign. He was not questioned about this phrase, but some parallel use of the account was made by Mr Haughey. During the years 1984 to 1992 funds other than the party leader's allowance, amounting to approximately £500,000, were lodged to the account. The tribunal has pointed out that numerous large round-figure payments were made from the account over the years. In 1986, for example, when the total allowance was just under £200,000, these round-figure payments totalled over £75,000. Mr John Coughlan SC, for the tribunal, said most payments were for smaller, odd figures which included pounds and pence. Mr Ahern said payments for round figures such as £10,000 and £20,000 were unusual, though some creditors might have been given part-payments of round figure amounts.
Mr Ahern said he had not known that funds to pay for medical treatment for the late Brian Lenihan were lodged to the party leader's account in 1989. He had no memory of signing any cheque meant to pay for such treatment. The tribunal has been told that £200,000 more than the party leader's allowance was lodged to the account that year.
The Taoiseach agreed that given Mr MacSharry was highly unlikely to have signed any such cheques, the only way payments for Mr Lenihan's benefit could be issued would be if the cheques were signed by Mr Ahern and Mr Haughey. It could have been, he said, that for reasons of confidentiality, cheques which had been pre-signed by him had been used.
Mr Sean Flemming TD gave evidence of how, as finance executive of the Fianna Fail party, he suggested to the then new leader, Mr Albert Reynolds, in 1992 that a new system for administering the party leader's allowance be introduced, because Ms Foy was retiring. Mr Reynolds approved the suggestion, which included introducing an annual audit.
Mr Flemming, who like Mr Ahern is an accountant, said the volume of round-figure payments from the allowance during Mr Haughey's reign was "very strange". He said he would not consider it normal and proper accounting procedure to pre-sign cheques. "It defeats the whole purpose of having two signatories to an account if one of them signs them in advance."