The Progressive Democrats have launched a scathing attack on the ethics record in office of Fine Gael and Labour. The party has accused Fine Gael of having "laundered clean" contributions from businessmen in the early 1990s.
In a detailed statement yesterday, PD Minister of State for Health Tim O'Malley said the party had worked since its foundation to improve political standards. "The PDs do not believe that two wrongs can ever make a right or that ethical lapses by one party justify similar lapses by another," the Limerick East TD said.
The PDs were "responsible for their own standards and, far from risking altitude sickness on the moral high ground, have worked since their foundation to follow basic and self-evident standards of political ethics".
In May 1993, he said, former supermarket magnate Ben Dunne gave Fine Gael a confidential payment of £100,000, which was lodged in an account controlled by the party's general secretary Ivan Doherty and subsequently paid into party funds.
"In the words of the McCracken report, it was treated in this way to ensure that it would not appear in the name of Mr Ben Dunne in the records of Fine Gael. So much for ethics from Fine Gael.
"It is interesting to note that Ivan Doherty was subsequently appointed a programme manager by Fine Gael in 1994. He worked directly to the then minister for tourism and trade. That minister was Enda Kenny. So much for ethics from Enda Kenny," he said.
In 1995, Mr O'Malley continued, the Norwegian telecoms company Telenor gave the late Fine Gael fund-raiser David Austin a cheque for $50,000 after Mr Austin had approached Denis O'Brien for a contribution.
"O'Brien directed him to Telenor, his Norwegian partners in owning Esat. According to O'Brien, Telenor 'wished to develop political contacts independently of Esat', whatever that means.
"Telenor gave Austin a cheque for $50,000 in January 1995. Shortly afterwards, Austin told the then leader of Fine Gael, Mr John Bruton, that the money was 'available to Fine Gael'.
"Because Telenor was to benefit from the granting of the new mobile phone licence to Esat, Bruton told Austin that the money should be 'left where it was'.
"Note, John Bruton did not refuse the money nor did he order that it should be returned. He asked that it be left where it was." Mr O'Malley added that it was eventually sent to the late Frank Conroy who passed it on to Fine Gael.
The PDs had never described themselves as "watchdogs over the standards of other political parties", though the party did believe that coalition government offered better accountability and transparency.
He added: "We do not intend to be goaded or lectured by politicians whose record includes the lapses mentioned above into reneging on that commitment to deliver two-party government.
"The public should remember that a lot of the barking from would-be political watchdogs in recent days has come from political parties whose leadership was closely associated with all of these matters," Mr O'Malley said.
"The PDs are condemned because of lapses which occurred in another party, yet, there have been grave ethical lapses in the parties which are loudest in condemning recent lapses. Before those parties start to hyper-ventilate too much, let us consider their own ethical records," he said.
