The High Court Taxing Master yesterday refused to sanction a £122,000 bill from the Workers' Party for expenses which it claimed it incurred in relation to the libel action taken by its former leader, now Labour Party president, Mr Proinsias De Rossa, against Independent Newspapers.
Reducing the bill to zero, Master James Flynn said the Workers' Party was using double standards. Its claims appeared to be "absurd" and "lacking rationality in clarity and silent in reason".
Indeed, the party "is cutting its own throat" because it was prepared to bill others at a rate 14 times that paid to its own staff, he said. This was a classic case of "double standards".
This type of "double think" could not be forced upon Independent Newspapers, he said. "It is clear that for the Workers' Party the only place where fairness comes before work is in a dictionary".
In July 1997, Mr De Rossa, who was a former Workers' Party leader before becoming leader of Democratic Left (now merged with the Labour Party) was awarded £300,000 damages and costs by the High Court after a jury found he had been libelled in an article by journalist Eamon Dunphy in the Sunday Independent in 1992.
Yesterday, Taxing Master Flynn totally rejected the Workers' Party bill for persons who helped discover documents in preparation for Mr De Rossa's libel claim.
He decided the party had been at no financial loss for work done, as those participating were or had been party members. The Taxing Master criticised a claim for £35,000 submitted on behalf of the party's general secretary, Mr Pat Quearney.
Either Mr Quearney was grossly underpaid by the party or alternatively the party was grossly exaggerating the value of the work performed by Mr Quearney, he said.
Master Flynn said Mr Quearney's claim produced a figure of £120.25p per hour which was about 14 times the value placed by the WP on his work.
The Taxing Master also reduced the £35,000 fee sought by the Workers' Party solicitor to £25,000.
Master Flynn said the Workers' Party, for the benefit of the membership and its supporters, had an obligation to assist in the De Rossa litigation. It had an obligation to the former leader for his devoted service to the party.
The party had a responsibility to its membership and accordingly the Workers' Party appeared to have a duty to assist Mr de Rossa and that was not necessarily an expense but rather a discharge of duty.
The Taxing Master said that a political party, unlike a commercial company, did not exist for profit. The allegations levelled against a former leader of the Workers' Party also affected the image and trust of the party itself.
In the De Rossa case the parties claiming fees were or had been at some stage associated with the party and accordingly signed into the rules.
The bill for £122,000 was not a cost of the party but rather the members. The party obviously patrolled the expenditure of members and accordingly would not permit a member to profit from meetings, seminars or courses.
Referring to Mr Quearney, who was paid a salary at the time of the libel action of about £15,000, the Taxing Master said Mr Quearney had been at no financial loss and neither had the Workers' Party.
That part of the bill in respect of Mr Quearney was £35,714.59 for an estimated 297 hours spent by Mr Quearney on discovery of documents. The average person worked about 1,800 hours yearly, which would mean Mr Quearney was paid about £8.33 per hour by the party.
"It is prepared to bill others at a rate which is 14 times what they believed to be a fair and reasonable rate and prefers to pay loyal members at a base rate which contradicts its political ethos."
In relation to the solicitor's fees, Master Flynn said that having regard to the immense volume of documentation, about 100,000 documents, he had no doubt that £25,000 was a fair and reasonable fee.