Pádraig Flynn smugly patronised counsel at the tribunal but shed little light on cash trail, writes Miriam Lordat Dublin Castle
SMUG, SELF-REGARDING, arrogant and patronising - there is nothing quite like Pádraig Flynn in full flow.
The former schoolteacher spoke very slowly to senior counsel Patricia Dillon, emphasising each word, like she was his very special project in a class of very slow learners.
Sometimes he raised a long index finger, indicating he wanted quiet because he hadn't yet finished speaking.
When he wanted to make a really important point, Pee simply ignored Patricia, swivelling to talk directly to the judge.
His performance brought to mind the quivering words of Mr Collins in Pride and Prejudice, when he spoke glowingly of his patron, Lady Catherine de Burgh: "Such condescension!" Nobody condescends like Pee.
Compared with Bertie, he has a different approach to tribunals.
Whereas the Taoiseach strives to assist with hilariously complicated excuses, Pee Flynn deigns to entertain their tiresome questions and then grants them the honour of a reply. Terse, monosyllabic answers, delivered with overweening confidence.
Different approaches, same scenario: large amounts of unexplained cash piling up in their safes when they were government ministers.
There was an added piquancy to Pee's reappearance in Dublin Castle yesterday. It dovetailed nicely with the return of his daughter, Beverley, to the Fianna Fáil fold last night.
A timely reminder of the reason she was kicked out of the parliamentary party in the first place. It happened after she lost her libel action against RTÉ when a jury found she encouraged people to evade paying tax by selling them financial packages involving offshore accounts.
Bev, even if she was acting on the instructions of her banking superiors at the time, does not accept to this day that what she did was wrong.
No matter. Hours after Père Pee's shiny shoes flapped their way out of the castle courtyard, his daughter was readmitted to the FF club by the unanimous vote of her elected colleagues.
She figured in tribunal dispatches, as we were reminded how she opened various investment accounts for her parents, kick-started by very large cash deposits taken from her father's well-stocked safe at home.
Pee can't remember removing the money and giving it to Bev, and during an earlier hearing she testified that she can't remember the details of the transactions either. Her financial acumen - one lot of the family money went through the Chemical Bank of New York - has never been in question. Just her memory.
A chip off the old block.
This might seem a little suspicious to people who might be of a suspicious nature. But in the interests of fair play, it must be pointed out that Pee was anxious to stress on a number of occasions that he was giving sworn evidence."Everything I say here is on oath, and I know what that means," he declared.
At one point, he looked at Judge Mahon and, with the greatest of respect, said he was also testifying before "a greater judge". When Pee speaks, God listens.
The £50,000 he got from developer Tom Gilmartin in 1989 was invested into a non-resident account with an address in Chiswick, London. Flynn never resided there.
However, the tribunal's use of the phrase "non-resident account" offends Pee's rarefied sensibilities. He insisted throughout the day that what he had was an "external account". He was also unhappy at the use of the word "paid" to describe the manner in which he was given the money by Gilmartin. "I dislike the inference of the word 'paid'," he sniffed loftily to Ms Dillon. He got a "contribution".
Furthermore, in further echoes of Bertie, that money was a "personal political" donation.
Fianna Fáil never saw it that way, but Pee insists this is the case.
Anyway, he lodged it in his non-resident account in June 1989, then withdrew it in two cash lots of £25,000 in October and November of the same year.
Here again Ms Dillon offended Pee. He didn't withdraw the money. It was his wife. Not the same thing. But did Dorothy not take out the cash on his direction? Pee levitated with annoyance, his voluminous eyebrows taking off towards the ceiling.
"I'm not in the practice of giving my wife directions!"
But she operated the account, didn't she. He had to agree.
Ms Dillon pressed on. So he had "no hand, act or part" in operating the account?
"That's a wild accusation," bridled the former minister for the environment and EU commissioner.
But true, he eventually conceded.
He couldn't remember how he gave the cash he took from his safe to Beverley so she could invest it. "One's daughter does occasionally come home," he told the lawyer.
There was always a lot of money in cash in that safe. Roll on to 1993, when she invested £33,000 for him. He's no idea where it came from, but he was a commissioner then, and reckoned a lot of it "was brought back from Brussels". The mind boggles.
Was it Belgian francs? wondered Patricia. Pee wasn't too sure. "Well, I brought it back and Mrs Flynn brought it back." To the busy safe in Casa Flynn in Castlebar.
The thing is, the money that kept building up in his safe over the years was "a confluence" of cash, streaming in from various strands of income. Politics is an expensive business, and when he wasn't spending money on getting re-elected he had other expenses, like putting tarmacadam on the driveway and buying furniture.
"I want to tell ya, there is nothing normal about an election." Pee would have the tribunal believe, for example, that in 1989, he spent over £40,000 in election expenses. His gross income was £51,000.
You wouldn't believe the size of Mayo.
There are no records of how he spent the money he kept in his safe. The lawyer wondered if he ever considered doing "a cost benefit analysis" of what an election cost? Pee never did. But he was a martyr to the accretions. That money just kept washing into his safe.
Then the story of Gilmartin's "contribution" hit the newspapers. It was in September 1998. On the day the first story appeared, Pee rang Gilmartin. Only to make sure that Gilmartin was as certain as he was that the cheque he gave him was for his personal political use. "I just wanted to check that my memory was the same as his."
Some of the calls went on a long time, but this was because Tom had personal problems, and he wanted a sympathetic ear. Pee Flynn hardly got a word in edgeways.
Fortunately for him, Commissioner Flynn kept a detailed note of some of their conversations, where he said the money was intended personally for him. Unfortunately, Ms Dillon showed two documented instances of where Gilmartin, years before their telephone conversations, had insisted the money was intended for Fianna Fáil. He said this again, just days after they had spoken, in a sworn statement to the tribunal.
Pee raised a finger, silencing Patricia. He turned to the judge and accused Gilmartin of telling "a litany of untruths and inaccuracies".
At the end of yesterday's proceedings, Judge Gerald Keyes snapped. Why didn't he acknowledge the generous contribution in writing? Pee said he just didn't. Hadn't he thanked Tom in person when he handed over the cheque? What about courtesy and good manners? Thanked him there and then, insisted Pee. "Astonishing, extraordinary," spluttered the judge.
"Sure I wanna tell ya, I thanked him on the spot," said Pee.
He's back this morning for more.