We need to talk about money, Micheál

To be taken seriously, Fianna Fáil’s new leader must address some problematic aspects of his party’s culture

MICHEÁL MARTIN has many attractions, not least that of being a bus conductor’s son. He behaved very well as minister for education at the time of RTÉ’s revelations of systematic abuse in industrial schools. As minister for health, he might have achieved something had he not been so openly undercut by Charlie McCreevy. But if he wants to be taken seriously as a new brand for Fianna Fáil, he has to address two big issues: money and accountability.

In over two decades in national politics, Micheál Martin has managed to say virtually nothing about the fact that two of the leaders he served under, Charles Haughey and Bertie Ahern, accepted large personal donations.

He remained steadfastly loyal to Haughey and had no apparent problem with Bertie’s dig-outs. Nor, when he was called before the Mahon tribunal’s investigation into the now notorious Quarryvale development, was he a model of clarity. The tribunal was investigating an allegation by Tom Gilmartin that developer Owen O’Callaghan had told him that, alongside other payments to politicians, he had “given a five-figure sum to Micheál Martin”.

It should be said that this allegation is extremely fuzzy and based on mere hearsay. It does not amount to a substantial charge of impropriety, let alone evidence of wrongdoing. Gilmartin’s own evidence to the tribunal on the matter was confused and inconsistent. And no record of any such five-figure sum was discovered by the tribunal.

The difficulty, though, is that everything else about payments by O’Callaghan to Martin is equally fuzzy. A payment of £1,000 in June 1989 was described by O’Callaghan as a donation to a school mini-project given via Martin but by Martin as a political donation to his campaign.

O’Callaghan first told the tribunal that £5,000 he gave Martin in 1991 was for the Atlantic Pond Restoration Fund and was given to Martin in his capacity as lord mayor of Cork. He then changed his evidence to say that it was “a political contribution to Micheál Martin for the June 1991 local elections”.

In relation to this donation Martin’s evidence was that “there was no issuing of receipts at that time in terms of election contributions”.

As for the £5,000 cheque, it was actually lodged to an account held by Martin’s wife Mary, not in Cork, but in Allied Irish Bank in Baggot Street in Dublin. (She was living in Dublin at the time and working for Fianna Fáil.)

Martin explained this by saying that at the time there were “no issues in terms of where you lodged the contribution or in terms of the manner in which you dealt with it . . . you used your personal money in your accounts, political contributions would have gone into your accounts”.

Martin had no memory of a meeting with lobbyist Frank Dunlop in November 1991, which was recorded in Dunlop’s diary.

More significantly, he denied point blank ever bringing O’Callaghan to “meet other politicians”.

He said that if he had ever brought O’Callaghan to meet Bertie Ahern he would remember it. Yet when the tribunal showed him Ahern’s ministerial diary for April 13th, 1994, which seemed to record a meeting with O’Callaghan and Martin, he could not recall it.

He denied point blank having any involvement whatsoever with the Quarryvale development.

We need to hear Martin talk clearly about the whole culture of money in Fianna Fáil.

We also need him answer a straight question: have his views on accountability changed since 2003?

Back then, he was embroiled in an extraordinary episode – the Department of Health, for which he was responsible, had illegally taken €2 billion in charges from elderly residents of nursing homes.

Martin stood up and took responsibility for this scandal. Only joking – he squirmed like an overstuffed wormery. He was given a briefing document that disclosed the scandal, but did nothing.

Why? Because, he explained, he did not read the brief. Here is his evidence to an Oireachtas committee on the question of responsibility:

Liz McManus: This will cost the State a significant amount and the longer it has gone on, particularly since 2001, the more costly it has become. Who is responsible?

Martin: I accept the conclusion of the Travers

[official] report that it was a long-term systemic corporate failure.

McManus: Who is responsible?

Martin: I have answered.

Liam Twomey: Is the minister saying he is responsible?

Martin: No.

McManus: I am still trying to get an answer. I asked the minister who is responsible. Is he saying that, as minister, he does not bear any responsibility for this?

Martin: I am; I do not.

This answer cuts to the heart of our catastrophic culture of misgovernment.

Is Martin going to hide behind the idea that Fianna Fáil is “a long-term systemic corporate failure”? Or is he going to stand up and accept personal responsibility for his part in that failure? Is this a change of image or a profound change of behaviour?