A group representing former owners of quarries and cement businesses is preparing a submission to the Moriarty tribunal urging it to inquire into the 1991 purchase of lands at Glen Ding, Co Wicklow, by CRH.
The group, the Quarry and Concrete Family Alliance, believes CRH has an "unacceptable level of dominance" in the construction materials market and that political favouritism over the years allowed this to occur.
A spokesman for CRH said an examination of the sale was "totally unwarranted" but that it would nevertheless "welcome a thorough and speedy investigation into the sale of Glen Ding in order to protect the company's good name and to bring to an end deliberately damaging and inaccurate comment".
The alliance claims its members have "suffered as a result of anti-competitive behaviour within the Irish quarry, concrete and cement industry throughout the last 30 years".
It feels the tribunal's terms of reference allow for an inquiry into the sale of the Glen Ding lands, despite the fact that there is no evidence that CRH ever made a payment to Mr Charles Haughey.
It says the late Mr Des Traynor brokered the merger in 1968 which saw Roadstone Ltd merge with Cement Ltd and the new company acquire the monopoly powers conferred on Cement Ltd by the Cement Act 1933.
Mr Traynor operated the Ansbacher deposits. In 1987, eight of the 15 directors of CRH had links with the deposits. Mr Traynor kept secret records of the deposits in his CRH offices, including records of an account belonging to Mr Haughey.
The alliance also claims the payment in 1986 of £18,150 (€23,046) by Irish Industrial Explosives, a wholly-owned subsidiary of CRH, to Geo-Engineering Ltd, of which Mr Conor Haughey and Mr Eimear Haughey are directors, is further reason to support an inquiry. The payment was in respect of consultancy and surveying services.
The Glen Ding lands were sold by private treaty by the then Department of Energy and were not put out to public tender. Mr Traynor was chairman of CRH at the time.
The alliance claims the price paid was only a fraction of the true value of the lands and that a number of operators in the area were interested in making an offer. Its members include: Mr John Scallon, formerly of Stoneford Quarries; Mr Pat Callaghan, formerly of Callaghan Ltd; and Mr Seamus Maye, formerly of National Concrete.
The CRH spokesman said a full and fair price was paid for the Glen Ding lands and no commercial benefit had yet accrued from the acquisition. Mr Traynor would have had no role in the purchase, he said.
Earlier inquiries into the Glen Ding sale by the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Dail Committee of Public Accounts have criticised aspects of the sale.
Last year, the chairman of the tribunal, Mr Justice Moriarty, said he felt himself precluded from investigating CRH or the Glen Ding sale because of his ownership at one stage of a substantial CRH shareholding. However, he may have changed that view since following submissions from Mr Frank Clarke SC, counsel for the public interest.
Mr Clarke said the Attorney General was of the view there were no constraints on Mr Justice Moriarty inquiring into matters concerning CRH, if he considered it appropriate.
CRH has said the Dail Committee on Public Accounts inquiry into the sale attached no blame to the company.
