A company linked to one of the State’s top maternity care doctors has made a settlement of €1.5 million with Revenue for underdeclaring taxes.
Newry-registered company, Veneris Consulting, formerly called Dr Hugh O'Connor Limited, paid €750,000 in tax and a further €750,000 in penalties and interest, according to the latest tax defaulters list released by Revenue. It was the largest individual settlement on the list.
A director of Veneris is Hugh O'Connor (58), with an address in Ailesbury Road, Ballsbridge, who is a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist at the Coombe maternity hospital, Sandyford's Beacon Hospital, St James Hospital and the Blackrock Clinic.
Mr O’Connor’s private consultancy website says he has more than 30 years’ experience and is a former lecturer at Oxford University. The website includes endorsements from celebrity patients of his.
He is also a reputable academic, and has had research papers published in the Lancet medical journal as well as the New England Journal of Medicine, American Journal Of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.
Mr O’Connor had not responded prior to publication to a request for comment on his company’s tax settlement with Revenue.
Medical sector
Medical doctors and companies in the medical sector featured prominently in the latest tax defaulters list, which outlined 18 settlements totalling almost €3.4 million in taxes and penalties.
Another medical consultant, Paul P Nicholson of Sandycove in Dublin, made a settlement of more than €62,000 in another Revenue audit case. Mr Nicholson is an orthopaedic surgeon at Blackrock Clinic in Dublin.
JNNK Medical, a medical staffing agency in Balbriggan, made a settlement of almost €67,500. The companies directors are Eddy Mindomba Boko, who has worked as a doctor for the State's Health Services Executive since 2009, according to his Linkedin page. The company's other director is Mimi Mindomba Bilonda, who lives at the same address as the doctor.
Another medical staffing agency, Abdeen Medical in Mullingar, made a settlement of more than €38,000. Its directors include a doctor, Awad Osman, and Manal Abdallah, who lives at the same address.
In all, almost €1 million spread across five of the settlements remained unpaid to the State at June 30th.
The largest outstanding debt was €375,000 owed by Michael Barry, a taxi hire operator in Graiguenamanagh, Co Kilkenny, who was audited by Revenue. Mary Barry, who lives at the same address, also owed Revenue more than €310,000, the second-largest outstanding debt to the State.
Ms Barry’s occupation was listed as a publican trading at Gahan’s pub in the town, which she has owned in a partnership that included Mr Barry.
The list also included The Morristown Educational Trust Fund, with an address in Galway, which made a settlement of more than €84,000 in capital gains tax and income tax, arising from a Revenue inquiry.
Henry Ryan, a PAYE worker from Castlerea in Roscommon, had the third-largest bill still outstanding at the end of June, of almost €144,000.
